Why is Christie's NFT auction so well known to auctioneers, but Sotheby's NFT sale so rarely discussed?

Author: 0x13, rhythmic BlockBeats

After Christie's elevated NFT creator Beeple to the top with a $69 million sale, Sotheby's chose an artist named Pak.

But it's clear that the Christie's and Beeple story has been almost universally heard on the Internet, and Sotheby's and PAK seem to have completely lost their voice.

In contrast to the mood at previous Christie's sales, no one seemed to care about the second NFT sale by the top auction houses, or even to advertise the completion of the sale. After all, Pak sold at Sotheby's for more than $16 million, which is not a small amount.

Why is there such a big difference in sentiment between top auction houses and crypto artists?

Pak's "perfunctory"

However, after Beeple, Pak, the second crypto artist to land on the world's top auction house, has not received overwhelming praise. In the eyes of many people, Pak's works are simply pieced together with C4D (3D modeling software) preset models.

Indeed, Pak's works seem too simple, unlike the diverse elements and rich colors found in the works of artists such as Beeple. In many people's eyes, Pak's works are worthless because anyone can make them.

But is it really so? If it's worthless, why did Pak become the first crypto artist to sell more than $1 million in total? And why did the world's top auction houses pick his work?

On April 12th Mr Pak's work made its debut at Sotheby's, the world's top auction house, and it has, predictably, set him back in the hot water.

This is not the first time people have questioned Pak's work.

In fact, Pak's most recent releases have been met with controversy, with some calling his work mystical and others calling it unmatched in terms of its conceptual nature.

Cubes at Sotheby's

Let's take a look at what he has prepared for Sotheby's sale.

First, an Open Editions, Fungible.

Yes, the price of a small cube changes over time, from $500 on the first day to $1,500 on the third day.

However, on this basis, PAK adds a new gameplay that has never been done before. Users will get NFT in different shapes when they buy different quantities of small cubes. There are 8 special shapes in total, and the corresponding number of blocks are 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1000 respectively.

For example, a user who buys a block will receive an NFT consisting of a block; Users who purchase six squares will receive two NFTs, one made of one square and one made of five. Users who purchase 26 squares will receive three NFTs, one made of one square, one made of five squares, and one made of 20 squares.

Look at the limited edition.

Complexity, a limited edition of 100 pieces, will be given away to the 100 users who purchase the largest number of open cubes.

The Cube, limited to 1 piece, will be given to The user who buys The most cubes in The open version.

Equilibrium, limited to 4 pieces, will be delivered through 4 mini-games:

The first will go to the user who solves Pak's Twitter riddle;

The second will be given to the user who bought Pak in the primary market and sold it at the highest price in the secondary market.

The third will go to the user who posted the highest number of views under the hashtag #PakWasHere;

The fourth will go to the user who had the most accurate estimate of the total before the auction began on April 12.

The Builder, limited to 30 pieces, will be given to The 30 artists, ecological founders, and creators who paved The way for PAK and other NFT artists, to be chosen by PAK.

Finally, there are two solo works in the auction.

The Switch, starting at $1.

The Switch is an interactive-programming work of art. From The outside, The work consists of two hollowed-out cuboids that symbolize The evolution of art in The digital realm. The owner of The NFT can use it to create an unspecified irreversible effect.

The Pixel, starting at $1.

Yes, it's not that your computer can't load the image, it's just a 1x1 gray pixel. The Pixel is visually just a single Pixel digital native work. But it's a sign, it's the most basic unit of digital imagery, that digital native art is moving into the future.

From a visual point of view, these works are very simple, such as pixel blocks, simple geometry and the stitching of geometry. It is precisely because of this that many people are puzzled and questioned: how can such a simple work buy tens of millions of dollars?

This is not the first time Pak has teased the public perception.

Change the name, double the price

In January 2021, PAK launched The Title series of crypto art on The Nifty Gateway. The whole set of works of art consists of nine works, which are all the same, rotating small cube except for their different names.

"The Cheap" is priced at $499 and "The Expensive" at $10,000, double The price of two open-edition pieces. Several other works sold for as little as $1 to as much as $1 million, and two auction editions sold for $17,000.

And that $1 million piece, "The Unsold," sold.

Helped Michelangelo "improve the fluidity of his work"

In February 2021, Pak conducted another "social experiment" at MakersPlace. He took Michelangelo's "The Creation of Adam" and divided it into small pieces. Buyers could bid for any of the pieces, but the ones that nobody bought turned black and the ones that did.

At the end of the auction, each portion sold will be minted as a NFT and distributed to the collector, with the collector who buys the most pieces getting the final work.

Is Pak's work really perfunctory?

Someone said his "art" is more and more elaborate, would be tantamount to "cut chives," indeed, the single from the point of the appearance of the works, Pak works hard to give a person sense of shock, simple geometric model to the audience the feeling is "I do", moreover also directly use the Michelangelo's "creation of Adam", therefore, in the eyes of many people, Pak's work is extremely perfunctory.

But we should also think about whether we can judge Pak's work by its appearance alone. Although Pak's works are not as visually striking as those of Beeple and Fewocious, etc., the concept conveyed by his works is thought-provoking enough. Pak should be classified as a "conceptual artist". For him, the tangible expression of his works is not important, but the concept.

  At this point, let's go back and look at Pak's work from a conceptual point of view. Maybe you can see what "conceptual art" is and why Pak deserves to be called "artist".

Start with The  Creation. Instead of appropriating Michelangelo's Creation of Adam, Pak breaks it up into pieces for collectors to buy. In fact, in this step, Pak is not "selling" the work, but "creating" a work of art with all the collectors.

Split a painting, each of which can be selected, can well reflect the people like is which part of the picture, maybe god and Adam's face, perhaps two people's fingertips, perhaps Adam's private parts, when we have to be a masterpiece of parts for trade-offs, we pay more attention to what is it? And when we got the hot for some parts, some parts are even neglected, is also from the same picture, square size is exactly the same, but have so far, so let's remove the unwanted parts, only part of the people like, people like part of the Mosaic art is complete, also is the people like?

The Title series highlights The conceptual nature of Pak's work. By giving different names to The same works of art and comparing The names of different works, he makes The sale of The whole series of works seem more interesting and ironic. For example, The works sold for as little as 1 dollar are named The Lucky and The Flipper, and The Unsold failed to sell at last. The two auction versions are called Copy and Paste.

Some people say that the work of art itself and the name of the work of art together constitute a complete version of the work of art, then the work of art itself and the name of the work of art in people's mind each of what proportion? Pak used the series as an experiment, assigning different values to the same piece of art through different names.

Pak's sale at Sotheby's is also worth examining. Was the $16.6 million total worth it?

The Builder, presented to The founders of crypto art, is itself an empty cube frame, symbolizing The founders' commitment to The field at its emptiest stage;

Is said to be a symbol of The art in The field of digital transformation of "The Switch", together with two hollow cube, is perhaps a symbol of The traditional art with encryption, respectively, they met in The course of history briefly, but later will be in their respective path, it also reflects The Pak for The traditional art with encryption, They shouldn't be either/or.

The most interesting is the open version of Fungible.

Pak likes to name a "non-homogenous" work "homogenous" in a slightly funny and ironic way. This NFT artwork does serve the role of "FT" (homogenized token, such as BTC, ETH) in terms of gameplay mechanics. Buyers who buy different quantities of Fungible will get different pieces of art, which can be thought of as "buying" different pieces of art with small squares.

This is not the first time that crypto artists have explored the difference between "homogeneity" and "non-homogeneity."

Cryptographic artist Mad Dog Jones, whose work is being auctioned at Fuarts, has published his Ideas r the currency series at the Nifty Gateway, When buyers buy five pieces of the series, they can exchange them for another piece of the series, and the five pieces that serve as "currency" will also be destroyed.

However, Pak's approach is more conceptual than Mad Dog Jones' use of different paintings as' money '. Single, identical cubes are more similar to the 'money' we use in our daily lives, serving as' cash equivalents' without a fancy, unique appearance.

Everyone has different aesthetics and different understandings of art, so many people look at the appearance of Pak's works and think that Pak is perfunctory. But from the point of view of the concept of each Pak piece and series of works, each piece is unique, innovative and meaningful. Everyone has the right to appreciate, evaluate and interpret works of art, because art is subjective, and works of art should be judged by everyone and from all angles. This article only provides a new perspective for you, so that you should not forget to think about the intrinsic value of the works of art while appreciating the appearance of the works of art. Some artists pursue the extreme beauty of the appearance of the works, while some artists pursue the value of the concept behind the works.

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