Natively Digital: A Curated NFT Sale

June 3, 2021 - Jan. 13, 2024

Sotheby's

Natively Digital is a series of digital exhibitions presented by Sotheby's. In 2021 a collection of remarkable, unique artworks was co-curated with Robert Alice. In 2024, Sotheby's presented a collection of Ordinals on the Bitcoin blockchain.


Works Shown

Quantum

2014, NFT

This code driven work presents an ongoing, abstract, cycle of birth, death, and rebirth. It tells this story through color, line and movement. In 2014, I had an idea to use blockchain technology to create indelible provenance and ownership of digital images of this kind. Quantum was the first ever to be recorded in this way.- Kevin McCoy, 2021 “How to picture the moment of creation. A spark, a seed, a particle. We have narratives that describe it as an interval of days or as a cryptic alphabet that divides the earth from the firma- ment. [Kevin McCoy’s]Quantum takes its place alongside other original icons replacing their aura and gilding with a pulsating luminous heartbeat. To call this a mandala would not be an understatment, since what is a mandala if not an allegory for a universe, its revolutions, breath and winking into being out of nothingness?” - David Geers, art critic, 2021

Brancher

2024, Generative Software

"Brancher" employs a constantly forking growth algorithm to make and unmake an organic image. Automating the thousands of decisions artists make as one draws, the code composes an image, then goes past a pleasing complexity into chaos. Then stripping lines away, it begins again. "Brancher" is part of Sotheby's “Natively Digital” series and is inscribed as an Ordinal on the Bitcoin blockchain.