NFT Drops From Notable Artists To Keep An Eye On In Early 2022

This past year, the non-fungible token (NFT) market has been booming. According to market tracker DappRadar, sales volumes of NFTs surged to $10.7 billion in the third quarter of 2021. Meaning, that the third-quarter figure was up from $1.3 billion in Q2 and $1.2 billion in Q1.

And while there are thousands of NFTs purchased each year, below, please find some of our favorite NFT drops from notable artists happening this month.

Raise Your Voice (Katja Novitskova)

For this series, Katja approached two fellow friends and artists, Kevin Bray and Alexandra Martens Serrano – both based in Amsterdam – to work on the project. The artists decided to develop a series of works that would seamlessly blend their artistic visions into something unique and appropriately weird for the new medium of NFTs.

Approaching the theme of Raise Your Voice and the environmentally-conscious aspect of Voice, an NFT platform for creators, the artists created a collection that channelled the ‘voices’ of living things that cannot speak the human language or communicate at all beyond their nature: animals, their genomes, proteins, microbes, mutants, biological networks, artificial organisms, laboratory experiments and other beings that exist between the categories of the living and non-living. Each NFT in the collection emphasizes that in the age of synthetic biology and industrial biotechnology, the collapse of biodiversity, widespread pollution, and depletion of the wilderness a massive re-articulation of life is taking place.

Translating these relationships into something culturally tangible and appropriately abstract – angel-like beings – with a given name and a virtual body, each angel captures and speaks for a certain aspect of contemporary ecological upheaval. The religious subtext of the series only points to our human need for a symbolic interpretation of environmental change on scales beyond our control and comprehension.

Together with this series and their collaboration attempt to bridge the categories of living and non-living, art and non-art. As an NFT collection, the works literally bring new life to the blockchain. All NFTs are one of ten and are for purchase on Voice. Three more NFTs in the collection will drop later this month.

One of One NFTs (Jim Rennert)

Internationally acclaimed American Sculptor  Jim Rennert is known for his life-sized and monumental sculptures on public display across the country. Inspired by his current bronze editions, his NFT work is no different.

What began as Rennert’s idea to encourage people to THINK BIG – bringing his first colossal bronze sculpture to New York City’s Union Square in 2014 – each NFT is meant to give the viewer pause and consider how we face our daily challenges as the city and the world keep turning around us. Each title works together with the visual image to illustrate the experience, sometimes physical, sometimes psychological and showcases the thoughts and ideas we all deal with in our contemporary society.

Each frame is digitally hand-drawn on an iPad using a stylus and each frame is then sequenced as an animation. Rennert’s first round of NFTs is single editions that can be purchased via Cavalier Galleries on OpenSea.

Graffiti Wall (David Ruggeri)

Created by St. Louis-based graffiti artist David Ruggeri, Graffiti Wall is a collection of four NFTs inspired by the societal conflict.

Available for purchase on OpenSea this week, each piece in the collection grapples with the need for a society to make and enforce rules that improve civilization and the need for people to express themselves and challenge authority. As can be seen frequently in graffiti culture, artists feel the need to create artwork that is available for the masses to view, but it’s the government's job to prevent the public property from being defaced in addition to assuring the messages and images that constituents can see while in public places are appropriate.

Each of the four NFTs is available as 1 of 1 on https://opensea.io/collection/no-graffiti. In addition, buyers have the option to receive a complimentary piece framed and shipped (U.S. lower 48 only) in addition to a signed empty can of spray paint used by the artist to create his paintings.

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