Art & Money — Interview with Tom Badley
Money Grows On NFTs
Back in early 2020, the NFT community was a different place with only a handful of artists and collectors. OG NFT artist Tom Badley minted his first NFT artwork in June 2019. He was one of the first crypto artists I collected and his art will always have a place in my heart. I asked Tom a few questions about his work. Here’s what he said.
Describe your style of art
My art owes a lot to physical banknotes — their design and production. There’s a subgenre of art that appropriates physical currency — think of Warhol making screenprints of dollars etc. such as The Death of Fiat. My art is a little different; I’m working with the same processes as banknote production to produce original works of art. As a result, my art often looks like money as in the Las Parabolas banknote series from early 2020 which depicts famous champions of crypto and represents a snapshot of crypto at a certain point in time.
What’s your creative process?
A lot of the focal point of my art is a portrait, and a concept comes from the portrait, usually. Drawing is the quickest way to create for me, and since I started drawing digitally in 2017, it was impossible to stop. Banknote design is quite involved, there’s a set process to go through. The effort to produce one artwork is enormous. I wish I was the kind of artist that could churn out hundreds of NFTs a week, but it would be impossible. In the case of handmade prints, I create the printing plates myself. It’s like a photographic process, so the plates are ‘developed’ by hand.
To preserve quality and scarcity, you burnt some early NFTs. How did it feel to destroy your art?
Maybe I should feel bad because other people might enjoy the art I’ve burnt. But art is the only thing I have that doesn’t run dry. It’s a bottomless pit, so if my digital art is burnt, or my physical art is destroyed, I can just make more, better than before.
Phygital artworks
Making physical artwork is very important to me. I think it’s essential as an artist to offer something physical, even if you love NFTs. It adds value and gravitas to your work. Most of my physical pieces are prints. I do sell some original drawings, but it’s rare because there just aren’t that many. As well as commercially printed artworks — prints made using conventional digital printing — I also make handmade lithographs and intaglio prints. On top of that, I create prints made in collaboration with security printers — organizations that print banknotes, among other things. This means that the prints are integrated with security features found in paper money — watermarks, invisible inks, security fibres embedded in the paper, and a level of detail that you can’t get in any other form of printing — many details require magnification to see.
Brexit
Brexit was a huge deal for people in the UK that divided the nation and dominated the daily news. To mark the event, Tom created iconic Bank of Brexit animated artworks. As a bonus for collectors, he sent signed postcard-sized copies in the mail that make the art more personal and special.
There is a great sense of humour in the back of the Brexit banknote that includes a quote from a far-right pro-Brexit politician Nigel Farage, ‘If an idea is indeed sensible, it will eventually become just part of accepted wisdom.’ Six years on from the UK exiting the European Union, perhaps the idea was not so sensible.
What’s the piece you’re the most proud of? Why?
I always say that the latest work of art I make is my best because part of the fun of making is to always outdo what I did before. I have written a book, ART&MONEY. It talks specifically about money, crypto, value, NFTs, and my art. I will be releasing 10 1/1 NFTs to coincide with the release of the book, the holders of the NFTs will receive a copy of the book personalized with signed artwork inside! ART&MONEY is the product of years of research; a story of the meaning and nature of money itself, written from the unique perspective of an artist from the world of money printing.
Thoughts on the future of NFTs?
It’s impossible to talk about the future of NFTs without talking about blockchain. At this point, I believe we’re very close to witnessing the conflict between true private cryptocurrency, and centralized blockchain. Digital assets — cryptocurrency, NFTs — are theoretically anonymous, if human identities aren’t connected to wallet addresses. But the blockchain is an open ledger. If wallet addresses are tied to physical identities, then it turns the blockchain into a perfect surveillance tool. In the end, it will be easy for governments to force the use of this surveillance tool, as everyone is utterly dependent on money. Even in ‘crypto land’, everyone needs to be able to easily on and off ramp from crypto into fiat. But if digital assets can only be sold into a centralized blockchain, which discloses one’s identity and hands the government complete control over one’s spending habits, then digital assets would be ring-fenced and, for all intents and purposes, banned. This is the essence of the coming conflict.
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Will private digital assets win over centralized blockchains? Yes, but I believe we will have to go through a period that will test what we think about money and value to the core.
In the end, I see NFTs playing an important role in global trade, especially as a backing for real-world commodities, in a world where staying local will be preferable to international travel and shipping. I also see NFTs, in their present form, as a testing ground for true digital barter, which will become a prominent feature of life, as we work out what money we ‘should’ be using.
Tom is available for commissions and his new book ART&MONEY will be launching on January 29th together with the release of accompanying NFTs on NiftyGateway.
Also on KnownOrigin, Blockchain Art Exchange, SuperRare, and Rarible.
Follow Tom on Twitter: @CurrencyDesign
