The Malaysian Insight

NON-FUNGIBLE tokens (NFT) have provided a new platform for artists to sell their work and Red Hong Yi is among the first Malaysian artists to get on board.

Red is most notable for creating a portrait of actor Jackie Chan out of bamboo chopsticks and most recently, for setting fire to a miniature map of Earth made of matches for TIME Magazine’s climate cover.

In her first venture into NFTs, she has come up with the Memebank series, in which she prints her own money to troll fiat currency.

“I was thinking about what to create as a NFT series and I thought about memes as they are very shareable and funny,” she told The Malaysian Insight.

“Cryptocurrency is internet money and something that is transferable. The idea about crypto is to replace conventional banking and notes eventually.

“The common saying about the banking industry is we will be dealing with inflation and the notes won’t be worth what they are worth now in the future because of the continued printing of money.

“Then I thought we will print our own money through art and highlight the weakness in the current system.”

NFTs are essentially a unique and non-interchangeable unit of data. Think of it like trading cards. When you trade a Pokemon card for a baseball card baseball card for example, they are two completely different and unique items.

NFTs mostly exists on the ethereum (ETH) blockchain, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency,.

The banknotes created by Red feature meme characters and crypto-related easter eggs to critique the financial systems. 

The six banknotes that have been created are inspired by the Chinese Yuan, US Dollar, Japanese Yen, British Pound, Singapore Dollar and Malaysian Ringgit.

All were sold via Opensea, one of the largest marketplaces for NFTs.

Dream come true 

The first Memebank note that was printed was called “Doge To The Moon”, Red’s take on the Chinese Yuan and was sold on July 21 for 36.3 ETH or RM352,000 at the time.

“During lockdown in May, my team and I researched and found that paper money first came from China and they were made using printing plates.

“(That is why) the first plate was dedicated to the Chinese yuan because of the history of paper money. We sold the first one in July in an auction and it fetched more than expected.”

The owner of the NFT will also receive the copper plate and 1/1 canvas print for the artwork, she said.

Part of the proceeds from doge went to support Mercy Malaysia Covid-19 relief fund while a portion was used to set up a community art project called Artists of Sea, which will feature the works of 100 at the Zhongshan Building from December 17 to 19.

It was after the sale of doge that the idea of setting up an exhibition came to mind, Red added.

“That’s when we decided to launch our own project and push aside all the commissions for six months.

“For the next five works, it was also about organising my own exhibition In January in APW, Bangsar from 21 to 23 January.

“Everything is going to be set up like a fake bank. All six of the copper plates will be on display. The owners have allowed us to exhibit them before they get shipped off.”

This will be her debut exhibition.

“I have always wanted to create a solo exhibition and I’ve never gotten to that point until NFTs were introduced. January will be my first solo exhibition. 

“NFTs have changed my career where I think for 10 years I’ve been taking commissions as it is the easiest way to pay bills.

“The con to that is that I wasn’t really able to do work that I wanted to create and there was a fear that no one would buy them. Now I’m able to do my own thing. I’m open to seeing how NFTs are going into other industries as well.”

The other Memebank notes are Diamond Hands, a take on the US dollar; Satoshi says NOPE (Japanese yen); Awkward Money Buys the Dip (British pound); The Praying Otter (Singapore dollar); and Where Lambo? (ringgit).

Doge and Diamond Hands were bought by a Malaysian owner while one NFT is owned by a Singaporean and the other three have chosen to be anonymous.

The piece that sold for the highest price was Diamond Hands at 54ETH (RM895,627) followed by Where Lambo? for 50ETC (RM829,284).

Future of art trading

Now that more and more artists are pivoting to the NFTs platform, Red believes this can lead to a new form of how art is traded, especially in terms of provenance and ownership.

“Van Gough, for example; he was not well known until he died. With the blockchain, we would have been able to trace where all his pieces went.

“Since the NFT platform allows the artist to set a royalty fee, every time it is traded, they get royalty fees. So in Van Gough’s case, his descendants get nothing from it.

“When I first started the Memebank series, I saw it as a proof of ownership  and that’s one of the things that really appealed to me because with my physical artwork, I do have to create a paper proof of authenticity. Some clients don’t need it but in 100 or 200 years’ time, who knows if that was created by me or not?

“Whereas with the blockchain, it would be something that is always permanent.”

“The question that begs asking then is, if it is a digital artwork available for download by all and sundry, what does the person who spent a fortune on it stand to gain?

This, Red says, is akin to owning a copy of the Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci.

“You can have a copy of it but it’s not the real painting. There is only one of it and it’s sitting in the Louvre in Paris.” – December 14, 2021.