COLOR FIELDS OF DREAMS

“The NFT movement is a significant moment in art history.”

Crow’s artworks are unique – and that’s saying a lot for the digital art space. He’s an abstract artist based in Orlando, Florida. His art is initiated around a process of creating color fields using non-conventional materials, including lights, scanners, mirrors, and printers. They are mesmerizing in their duality: simple and complex.

“It is an unorthodox process that generally begins with shining lights into the scanner,” Crow explains. “These inputs are printed using techniques to manipulate the output. The printer is intentionally misused to create layers that can resemble paintings with acrylics or oil. The output layers are then stacked and rescanned or layered digitally. My process is 95% analog.”

Why web3 and the NFT space? Crow has been involved with cryptocurrency since 2011 but only took notice of NFTs in February 2021. For him, he was drawn to the NFT space first as a collector, where he spent nearly a year solely as a collector and making connections with artists and communities. He then began creating his own art for the blockchain.

Web3 allows artists to reach a worldwide audience in a new way. It eliminates a number of the barriers of the gallery system – and also provides on-chain provenance. It is also why he mints all his artwork with Manifold contracts. “Manifold smart contracts are a great tool for artists and me personally. They create a big portfolio of my artistic output that I can take anywhere, even from platform to platform. If one NFT platform closes, it won’t affect my work or my collectors. This gives me total control of my artwork.”

According to Crow, the NFT space is a significant moment in art history. “The art world has opened up with NFTs, not just financially but in opportunities for artists to make connections, work on collaborations, and discover new ideas and techniques. This period that we are currently in will be remembered in future art history books.”