Celebrating AANHPI Heritage Month with a look at some of the best Asian NFT creators and platforms | Ingram Yuzek Gainen Carroll & Bertolotti, LLP

May is also Asian American Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Heritage Month. The month of May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, and the completion of the first transcontinental railroad on this day 154 years ago (May 10, 1869).

To celebrate AANHPI Heritage Month, we at Ingram’s NFT Newsroom are highlighting a handful of top Asian NFT creators and/or platforms.

NFT Asia:

NFT Asia was founded in March 2021 by a team of artists to provide an “open and inclusive community centered on uplifting Asian and Asia-based artists and creative people worldwide.” Last year, NFT Asia curated a list of artists working with NFTs from across Asia and held an exhibition titled A Screen of One’s Own on the eve of NFT NYC 2022. This year, NFT Asia is partnering with imnotArt to present an exhibition titled Digital Expression at imnotArt’s physical gallery in Chicago, IL from May 17, 2023 to May 31, 2023, along with a metaverse showcase. This exhibition aims to highlight the diversity within digital art and the web3 community through both physical and digital displays and to strengthen and expand the relationship between Western and Eastern art and the web3 community. NFT Asian and imnotArt are accepting submissions to be selected for this exhibition from May 8, 2023 to May 12, 2023. Check their Twitter for more information!

Grape Kataoka:

Drue Kataoka is a Japanese-American artist who fights racism through NFTs. In May 2022, she launched her first NFT In The Club: #StopAsianHate. Kataoka described the NFT: “It is a digital monument to the uplifting power of pan-Asian unity, allies, and the diverse Asian American and global voices marching to the heartbeat of a higher calling. There are many names but no photos in the original clubhouse that started a movement. Instead, there is a gaping hole above each activist name – a window into the world around us, and the pain and beauty of this historic time. The song from the streets, recorded at a recent protest, is overlaid with the heartbeat of the artist, an Asian-American woman, who acts like a clock to “create” a stream of new names at a relentless pace. At the end of the 1-minute artwork, the scene fades into timelessness and history under the onslaught of powerful winds – a nod to Qi/Chi/Ki/Prana literally ‘air’ – the vital energy and life force of many Asian cultures.” It was sold for 35,000 dollars. Kataoka also partnered with ILMxLAB to auction her NFT Will Your Heart Pass the Test? which sold for $252,000. All proceeds from the sale went to Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change and #StopeAAPIHate.

Specifically to celebrate AANHPI month, Kataoka curated the exhibition titled #TheGoldStandard, which showcases ten artworks from Asian-American artists, “ranging from rising stars in the NFT space to scientists and researchers pushing the boundaries of what is technically possible in crypto. to veterans of some of the world’s leading special effects houses in the entertainment industry, to art entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley.”

Munira Hamzah a/k/a Mumu The Stan:

Munira Hamzah is a rising Malaysian NFT artist and founder of MalaysiaNFT, a non-profit organization that supports Malaysian artists in the NFT scene and serves as an online platform that provides educational materials, coinage funds as well as peer support to local creatives. She is a strong community leader and advocate for gender diversity and increased awareness and support for mental health, both of which are very difficult topics to discuss (or even acknowledge) in many Asian cultures.

This month she launched a new physical and NFT collaboration with Hiredly.com (unfortunately the link is posted on her Twitter may not be available for US-based users). The NFT collaboration is a series of pixelated cartoon sticks that give buyers an opportunity to claim an exclusive NFT.

Emily Yang a/k/a ppleplesr:

Emily Yang is a Taiwanese NFT artist who started creating animations to promote DeFi protocols after Apple withdrew a job offer, leaving Yang unemployed in New York. Her work was quickly recognized and she recently went viral. Yang produced a video for Uniswap that sold for $525,000. Since then, Yang has created a DAO to support her work, partnered with Fortune to launch a philanthropic fund to promote investigative journalism and promote journalistic integrity, and designed the April cover of Vogue magazine’s Taiwan issue. Yang has used the proceeds from the sale of her art to create the Stand With Asians Community Fund, which raised over $850,000 to strengthen the AAPI community, and an NFT collective for charitable work.

Not only is it incredibly refreshing to see AANHPI representation in this sector, but it’s also incredibly heartwarming to see so much humanity and compassion from these artists. Do you have a favorite AANHPI NFT artist? We’d love to hear how you can celebrate AANHPI Heritage Month this year.