The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) has added 10 CryptoPunks and 10 Chromie Squiggles NFT artworks to its permanent collection.
CryptoPunks are digital characters, each of the size 24×24 pixels, created on the Ethereum blockchain. They were created by Larva Labs in 2017. Chromie Squiggles are random, wavy digital works created by Erick Calderon. Both of these series created 10,000 works; given the nature of blockchain, the number could not be altered, nor the works themselves could be modified in any way.
CryptoPunks are considered one of the most famous NFT works of all time. Chromie Squiggles were the first launch on ArtBlocks, the NFT art marketplace. However, there had long been a debate on whether NFT artworks are “actual” works of art. The naysayers have a couple of strong arguments. NFT works are entirely digital, and while physical copies have existed, they are meaningless. Beyond the initial idea, NFTs like CryptoPunks are generated randomly. The NFT boom of 2021 saw massive interest in NFT works, but the noise has since almost died.
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The inclusion of CryptoPunks and Chromie Squiggles into MoMA’s permanent collection is a significant move towards legitimizing NFTs as artworks and including them in the canons of art history. Digital art advisor Georg Bank said, “The acquisition of Cryptopunks and Chromie Squiggles by the world’s most important institution for modern and contemporary art is a clear sign that the crypto art movement has arrived in the canon of art history at an institutional level.” Diane Drubay, curator and founder of We Are Museums and WAC Lab, said: “With CryptoPunks and Chromie Squiggles, MoMA acquired more than digital art; they support digital cultures that go beyond the technology and the market.”
