The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has entered the NFT game.
Among its acquisition of 63 works of art for its permanent collection, the museum now has its first-ever non-fungible token by San Francisco artist Lynn Hershman Leeson, titled âFinal Transformation #2, 2022,â featuring actor Tilda Swinton, SFMOMA announced Thursday, Jan. 12.
In the art world, NFTs usually contain digital files including audio, visual, text or video elements created by artists. Leesonâs NFTâs content is in conversation with her 1997 feature film âConceiving Ada,â starring Swinton as Countess Ada Lovelace, the author of the first computer algorithm. âFinal Transformation #2, 2022â includes a video excerpt from the final scene of the film as well as an image related to Leesonâs multimedia installation âInfinity Engine,â which shows petri dishes containing DNA. The accompanying text to the image â âthe redeeming gift of humanity is that each generation recreates itselfâ â comes from the film.
The NFT is an edition of two, the first of which Leeson created for SFMOMAâs 2022 Art Bash auction. It was the artistâs first foray into the medium and was sold for $9,000, benefitting the museum.
NFTs became a major topic in the mainstream art conversation at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020 as many visual art experiences moved toward digital presentations due to pandemic-related closures. A 2021 report by NFT data company NonFungible.com and tech analysis firm LâAtelier BNP Paribas showed the NFT market trading increased by 21,000% to $17.6 billion over $82 million in 2020.
Many criticized the NFT market as a cynical money grab and overinflated bubble due for collapse. By May 2022, NonFungible.com reported sales of NFTs were down around 90% compared to its 2021 peak. The energy costs and carbon footprint of NFTs have also been criticized.
For her part, Leeson said she was asked to create the second NFT specifically for the museumâs collection by Rudolf Frieling, SFMOMAâs curator of media arts. Both NFTs were gifted by Leeson to the institution.
âLynn is a towering figure and pioneering spirit in Bay Area art,â Frieling told The Chronicle. âShe is a role model for all contemporary artists as she has continuously reinvented and recreated her own artistic identity for over 50 years, always with a critical and yet hopeful approach to technologies. This work is a fitting addition to SFMOMAâs holdings as we have collected objects in all of the mediums she has worked in over her expansive career.â
In the spring of 2022, the installation âRoom #8â (part of Leesonâs âInfinity Engineâ series) was part of the SFMOMA exhibition âSpeculative Portraitsâ (curated by assistant curator of media arts Tanya Zimbardo) and is now in the museumâs permanent collection.
âRudolf did my very first show in Berlin in the mid-1980s; heâs seen the trajectory of what my work has been all these years,â Leeson told The Chronicle. âHeâs one of the few curators that really looks to what new media is and what the new art forms are.â
Leeson, 81, has been working in emerging technology-based media for five decades and was recognized last year at the Venice Biennale for her video installation âLogic Paralyzes the Heart,â featuring San Francisco actor Joan Chen as the worldâs first cyborg, now experiencing an existential crisis 61 years after their creation.
But those hoping for more NFTs from Leeson are out of luck.
âI did this one in particular because Rudolf asked me to, but I doubt that Iâll be doing other ones,â said Leeson. âThere are other projects I want to do more, and I donât want to break my limited concentration.â
Leeson is currently working on part four of her âCyberborgian Rhapsodyâ in San Francisco, a film follow-up to âLogic Paralyzes the Heart,â with a script written by artificial intelligence.
Among the others works acquired by SFMOMA are pieces by 18 artists not previously represented in the permanent collection. These include paintings and works on paper by Troy Lamarr Chew II, Derek Fordjour, Toyin Ojih Odutola and Maja Ruznic; photographs by Yolanda Andrade, Emi Anrakuji, Anthony Lepore and Tokuko Ushioda; an installation by Amalia Mesa-Bains; design works by Pentatonic and Peter Saville; sculpture by Iman Issa, Suki Seokyeong Kang and Minouk Lim; and media arts installations by Rosa Barba, Richard Mosse and New Red Order.
The new multimedia installation âOf Whalesâ by Wu Tsang has been on view in the museumâs atrium since December.
The Bay Area artists represented in the acquisitions include artist and activist Yolanda LoÌpez; painter and musician Mike Henderson; photographer Alice Wong; and mixed-media artists Sergio De La Torre and Chris Treggiari of the Sanctuary City Project, and Susan OâMalley.
SFMOMA Director Christopher Bedford said in a statement that the acquisitions represent âan incredible range of artistic vision and capture SFMOMAâs commitment to collecting works by artists from the region and across the globe.â
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