The Marina Abramović NFT drop celebrates the heroes of the Web3 era

Marina Abramović’s debut NFT drop celebrates heroes from the Web3 era

NFT hype may have died down since its stratospheric rise in 2021, but Serbian artist Marina Abramović, ever forward-leaning, is looking beyond with the release of her first appearance in the Web3 space. Launch on Monday 25 July at 14:00 UTC on the energy-efficient blockchain Tezos, The Hero 25FPS is a digital adaptation of one of the artist’s most personal and autobiographical works, featuring her stoically dressed in black, on a white horse and holding a large white flag.

‘The hero was filmed in 2001, around the time my father Vojo died, explains Abramović. “He was a national hero from the Second World War and I wanted to create a tribute to him.”

Abramović’s debut NFT drop is a collaboration with the Cultural Institute of Radical Contemporary Art (Circa), which describes itself as “a digital art and culture platform with a purpose”. It coincides with the broadcast of The hero on an international network of screens, spanning London, Seoul, Milan, Berlin, Japan and New York, at 20:22 local time every night for three months.

‘When [Circa artistic director and founder] Josef O’Connor invited me to participate in Circa 2022, I immediately thought The hero Because right now we are facing a third world war. We never set out to make an NFT – it came as a surprise, says the artist.

Originally filmed in PAL (4:3 aspect ratio), the video work required several months of post-production, each frame edited to adapt it for widescreen. “I really wanted the image to envelop the audience,” says the artist. “As with all my work, the audience completes the work. My first appearance on the blockchain will invite people to collect either a single frame (.jpg) or a sequence of frames (.gif) to gain time. They decide how much of the movement and experience they can have with the work.’

So why has the artist chosen to revisit a two-decade-old work – and what relevance does it have today? ‘Right now we are in such a strange moment in our world. We are destroying our planet where we live, our real home, the earth, and there are all the wars going on in the world. We need heroes,” she asserts, citing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and climate activist Txai Suruí, the only indigenous woman who spoke at the COP26 climate conference, among her “new heroes.”

The term Web3 (originally Web3.0) was coined in 2014 by computer scientist Gavin Wood, founder of blockchain infrastructure company Parity Technologies and co-founder of Ethereum, to describe his vision for a decentralized and more democratic Internet. “For me, the whole world has always been divided into two categories: originals and those that follow,” reflects Abramović. “The originals are visionaries – they always think outside the box. And often during the time they are alive, they are not understood at all. Sometimes it takes years after they are dead, even hundreds of years, for them to be properly understood. Today we need people with this vision to create new ways of learning and forms of art.’

Abramović has previously been vocal about her skepticism about NFTs, but draws parallels to the acceptance of video and performance art as new artistic media, both of which faced similar criticism and resistance in their early days.

“When we started working in the intangible [in the 1970s]galleries and museums could not sell anything because there was nothing [physical] to sell, she says. “Similarly, video was a mess when it was invented. Then came Nam June Paik and video art was born. Paik once said, “I think the best technology, information, has to do with our education—our thinking.”

For Abramović, the potential of Web3 extends beyond NFTs. “In many ways, we’re starting to see how this new tool can make a difference in the world,” says the artist, citing Bail Bloc as an example. The app, developed by The new survey magazine, allows anyone to volunteer to use computing power to mine cryptocurrency that is used to pay for Americans without bail to get out of jail. ‘The work [Pussy Riot co-founder and social activist] Nadya Tolokonnikova is doing with UnicornDAO is also very inspiring for me,’ adds Abramović. The cryptocurrency investment fund raised $6.7 million for Ukraine earlier this year and recently launched legalabortion.eth, where people can donate crypto to be fully distributed to reproductive rights organizations following the US Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v Wade.

Likewise, Abramović donates a percentage of the proceeds from her NFTs to ‘Hero Grants’, and invites people working within Web3 to submit ideas ‘that make the world a better, more beautiful place’ via the Circa website. She says: “I want to see what other ideas people have in this Web3 space to help save our planet. People who show heroic vision will then receive a scholarship over the next few months. The grants we will give away The Hero 25FPS is my small way of contributing to this future.’

Ultimately, the artist seeks to empower the next generation. “The future of performance art is in the hearts and minds of this new generation working with these new technologies. They are experimenting with this new Web3 space and testing its potential. They take risks and build new worlds, says Abramović. “We must guide and nurture the future. I’m no expert [on Web3] but I am learning, and what I fundamentally understand is that blockchain technology gives artists sovereignty over themselves and their work – this is very important to me. This is a very challenging time for young people, especially artists. Art will always exist. And in 2022, the white flag I held all those years ago stands for peace.’ §