In web3, we have the amazing ability to be connected to basically anybody via social media, where we can interact with and learn from them. The history of art is the history of technology and communications, after all, so this moment makes sense.”
With a background in traditional art, including a Master’s degree in Art History, Aniko Berman brings an entirely fresh perspective to both art’s creative and commercial sides, NFTs, and web3.
After working for a number of years in galleries, Aniko decided it was time to move on. “Selling expensive paintings by established artists to rich people was cool, but not that interesting,” Aniko shares. “For me, identifying talent and working with them to build their brands as artists and promote them became more interesting.”
She left the art world with an MBA and a bit more business savvy under her belt and looked to VC for a new challenge, but after a friend founded a music NFT platform, she began to learn all about NFTs and saw how she could blend art and VC together. “VC relates the idea of identifying opportunities, adding value to them, and then growing them. NFTs show us a way for the traditional art world to be shifted, and modified, so I had a perfect skill set to enter this space.”
Her biggest collaboration to date was the wildly successful pairing of Diana Sinclair visuals with a previously unreleased demo track Whitney Houston had recorded as a 17-year-old. Building on that, Aniko moved into artist management, working with artists Cory Van Lew, Andre Oshea, and SamJ. She is now launching her own agency working with web3 and traditional talent on creative strategies.
New technologies call for different approaches to art. In the traditional art world, artists often exist in isolation, vacuum-packed in ivory towers, but today’s artists exist in a new dimension where interaction is important. “I think that in web3 we have the amazing ability to be connected to basically anybody via social media where we can interact with them. The history of art is the history of technology and communications, after all, so this moment makes sense,” she says. “Technical virtuosity is not of paramount importance, but relatability is. Traditional artists are finding a way into web3 as a way for them to stay relevant.”
As Aniko sees it, the more artists who are influential in the traditional space adopt NFTs as the new way of creating and being commercially successful, the quicker it will become normalized. “Artists can now exist at many different levels simultaneously, and this will boost NFTs and ultimately benefit art and culture more generally.”
For Aniko, the fusion of trad and rad is what is exciting – and we agree!
