Proof-of-work: The Bitcoin artists on minting NFTs and OpenSea

cointelegraph.com:

“Art is not a thing, it is a way,” said American writer Elbert Hubbard. For Bitcoin (BTC) artists, the way is inspired by Bitcoin, its code, its philosophy and its imagery. In some cases, it’s even inspired by memes. Bitcoin has become a “lifestyle,” for some Bitcoin artists, that inspires their way of doing business, accepting payments and interacting with customers. 

Cointelegraph asked Bitcoin artists what inspires them about Satoshi Nakamoto’s 13-year-old invention and whether minting a nonfungible token (NFT) would complement their “way” of doing art. After all, an NFT is a unique, digital receipt to prove ownership of a purchase that lives on a blockchain. Surely artists would want to prove ownership of the art at which they toiled away?

Lena, a Bitcoin artist who recently moved from Germany to crypto-friendly Dubai, began creating, painting and printing Bitcoin artworks after diving down the Bitcoin rabbit hole in 2018. She says that while she started her crypto career as a crypto-agnostic, Bitcoin changed her approach and eventually took over. She now operates a Bitcoin “maxi-style” portfolio:

“My mindset shifted and I began to work on myself, asking myself what to do with my lifetime because of Bitcoin. Bitcoin became like a lifestyle, so I should put all my savings in Bitcoin.”

When speaking with people in the crypto community, she explains she’s a Bitcoin artist, to which crypto-lovers ask, “oh, so you do NFTs?” She told Cointelegraph she replies with, “No! Physical art!”

“OpenSea is full of art that is like not art — I mean, art is always up to the person, but it was too much for me.”

However, countless artists make a living generating AI artwork and selling or minting them as NFTs on platforms such as OpenSea.