Vincent Van Dough talks about disruptive galleries and the power of Pepe
The pantheon of pseudonymous NFT collectors has no shortage of enigmatic characters, but few enjoy the crypto-native cult of Vincent Van Dough.
Considered a key advocate for the digital art ecosystem, the 2023 NFT100 honoree is known for its NFT spending and eclectic projects, which now include the Web3 gallery Art of This Millennium (AOTM), Remarkable Pepes series, TungstenDAOand more.
While he has been active in crypto since 2013 and was among the original claimants of the CryptoPunks, Van Dough’s current alias dates back to 2021. In an interview that year with The blockhe claims to have spent over $20 million on NFTs.
Fittingly, Van Dough’s digital identity is more fluid than many of his contemporaries. There is no recognizable CryptoPunk to hang your hat on. There’s an ever-changing array of avatars that all somehow carry the same memetic energy, from a tuxedoed Pepe the Frog and Che-Yu Wu’s Sea Hams to “Moonbirds” he got to troll Kevin Rose. You know it when you see it.
As a collector, Van Dough can distill his thesis into a simple statement: “Collect works of art that resonate.”
“Beyond just aesthetics, it’s a combination of intuition and knowledge of internet culture, identifying promising artists, keeping a pulse on the contemporary art landscape and always looking for art that has a fresh and unique perspective,” he tells nft now. “Collecting is not a job for me; it’s something I really get meaning and fulfillment from.”
While fundraising may not be a job for him, others have tried to use his investment approach. In August 2021, Su Zhu and Kyle Davies, the founders of now-defunct crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, tapped Van Dough to raise a $100 million NFT fund called Starry Night Capital.
In the following months, Van Dough helped the fund amass an impressive collection of blue-chip NFTs, including projects like CryptoPunks, Deafbeef, and Autoglyphs, 1/1 art by XCOPY, Alpha Centauri Kid, and Grant Yun, and notable Art Blocks- pieces by Tyler Hobbs, Dmitri Cherniak and Snowfro.
Unfortunately, Three Arrows Capital declared bankruptcy in July 2022 following the Terra Luna collapse, and Starry Night’s collection is currently embroiled in liquidation proceedings. In an October 2022 filing, consulting firm Teneo cited Van Dough’s cooperation in helping them account for and take possession of Starry Night’s assets.
“I bought them a bunch of jpegs and curated the Starry Night Capital collection,” Van Dough commented on Twitter. “That is the extent of our connection.”
Given the experience, it’s no surprise that Van Dough’s next chapter will signal a new direction by prioritizing direct engagement with the artists he champions.
A Web3 native gallery model
Launched in November 2022 and powered by Manifold, Art of This Millennium is a digital gallery with a star-studded artist roster featuring the likes of Cath Simard, Claire Silver, Drift, FVCKRENDER, IX Shells and many more.
For such an irreverent iconoclast, one might be surprised to hear Van Dough admit that the venture was “born from the idea that there was a lot to learn from the traditional art world.”
“Artists today must run full-scale businesses independently: from creating pieces to managing auctions, maintaining relationships with both existing and potential new collectors, exhibiting their work and process, participating in interviews, and the list goes on,” he explains. “It is impossible for one person to manage. We saw a world where a gallery could come and work hand in hand with artists.”
Unlike traditional art galleries, which can take up to 50 percent of sales, AOTM takes a flat 15 percent commission. Van Dough has also promised to honor a 10 percent secondary sales royalty for artists regardless of “where or how any piece is sold.”
“The term ‘NFT’ is too broad a term and unfortunately a lot of cutting edge art has been thrown into this broad word which has become synonymous with flipping and trading.”
Vincent van deig
By offering vertically integrated services to contemporary digital artists – including curation, promotion, strategy, exhibitions, sales and legacy planning, as well as leveraging collector relationships inside and outside Web3 – Van Dough hopes to further differentiate the digital art market from the rest of the NFT space.
“The term ‘NFT’ is too broad a term and unfortunately a lot of cutting edge art has been thrown into this broad word which has become synonymous with flipping and trading,” he laments. “We see AOTM as a home for artists, collectors and patrons who value art for its aesthetic and cultural significance rather than short-term monetary value.”
When you talk to artists on the AOTM roster, consistent themes emerge around the respect they have for Van Dough and the support and guidance he’s given them.
“I’ll never forget when he first tweeted about me after collecting my work ‘Right click to print.’ It changed my life, he recalls Alpha Centauri Kid. “I think he’s an outstanding collector because he’s not afraid to show his conviction in the artists he believes in. He really just wants to help push art forward.”
Grant Yun credits Van Dough’s early support with giving him critical momentum, praising the collector’s “depth of knowledge” and “willingness to mature this space.”
“I am confident in the work VVD is doing and trust his vision,” says Yun. “I truly believe that a level of curation is needed in Web3 to help guide the non-crypto demographic and to help open their eyes to the amazing array of artists this space has to offer.”
Another world adds, “On a personal note, he’s a down-to-earth guy who has given me great advice when I’ve asked, which has been a huge help to my career in this new and ever-changing field.”
As Van Dough continues to build out AOTM, he has plans to establish a physical footprint for the gallery and an upcoming auction featuring a selection of emerging artists.
“The crypto NFT market can often be volatile and rapidly evolving,” he warns. “We have to think about what’s best for our artists from a long-term horizon, not just what will be a hot narrative in the short term.”
Supplier of Pepe
Van Dough’s online persona is inextricably linked to Pepe the Frog, Matt Furie’s iconic 2005 cartoon character that has become one of the internet’s most enduring and often misunderstood memes.
An avid collector of the early and influential CounterParty project Rare Pepes, Van Dough has long been a patron of Pepe-inspired art. Last July, Van Dough curated a series of the latter-day CounterParty project Fake rare, launching the likes of DeeKay and Seerlight for Pepe tributes. Given the project’s historical ties to the earliest days of blockchain art, Van Dough felt honored to help usher in a new generation of artists.
“Pepe the Frog is an iconic meme that represents the culture of the internet. It really is our Mickey Mouse figurine head, Van Dough gushes. “Pepe represents the power of the internet to shape and influence our perception of the world.”
“Pepe the Frog is an iconic meme that represents the culture of the internet. It really is our Mickey Mouse figurine head.”
Vincent van deig
As it happens, the Fake Rares series would prove to be a foreshadowing for Van Dough’s own Pepe project. After Jack Butcher’s riotous Checks phenomenon sparked an open edition craze at the top of the year, he launched his own version called Pepe Checks. Offered at a price of $6.90, his open edition “exceeded all expectations”, raising more than $1.6 million in 24 hours.
“It basically all happened overnight,” Van Dough admits. “I saw an opportunity to create a piece of art and a meme that felt like the right comment in response to Jack Butcher’s Checks, and the community just ran with it.”
“It really shows how people want to collect items that resonate with them and how Pepe is one of the most recognizable figures on the internet,” he adds. “The Checks harnessed the collective humor and creativity of the internet – it’s quite beautiful.”
A week later, Van Dough announced his new project titled Notable Pepes. Each Pepe Check offers a new twist on the classic Rare Pepes and Fake Rares model, acting as a lottery ticket that gives holders a chance to create weekly Pepe art drops. The collection has already featured cards from Rare Pepe OGs like Joe Looney and Rare Scrilla, along with modern up-and-comers like Terrell Jones and batz. In this way, Van Dough aims to “bridge the gap” between the Pepe communities on CounterParty and Ethereum.
“We brought a majority of the OG Rare Pepe and Fake Rare artists into Notable Pepes, and we also invited prominent ETH artists to create Notable Pepe cards,” he says. “The response has been incredibly positive and the meme is stronger than ever. People wanted a way to collect and interact with the Pepe community in a way that was familiar to them and ETH native.”
At a time when the $PEPE meme coin dominates the charts and the conversation, Van Dough’s memetic wisdom feels especially prescient.
“There’s this saying, ‘There’s a Pepe for everything’,” he concludes. “It is so true. The Pepe community is one of the most resilient communities; people rally through bull markets and bear markets, and support meme culture and art.”
