DRONE GRAFFITII HITS THE DIGITAL STREETS : THE META CANVAS BY KATSU
image via katsuru
Katsubot is a graffitii artist most know for his innovative tech-driven style within the digital space.
The narrative around his work has evolved through out the past years, alot of his artworks speak on consumerism, social action and commentary on the social space; internet. He first became known around the 1990s amongst the New York City graffitii community. He went from pioneering the scene with fire extinguishers to now using drones that he built. The mediums he's used for his street art has allowed him to tag on such a massive monumental scale, you can find YouTube videos of these moments documented as he sloshes billboards with his creations.
The meta-canvas is his most recent artistic venture just yet, following the OFFKAT Fashion Art Project with him and Virgil Abloh, former Louis Vuitton Creative Director. Katsu is planning on releasing a swarm into the metaverse with this new project. According to his website the project will consist of 5,432 minted spray cans. Each will be styled in a nostalgic 8-bit video game aesthetic, these will be purchased on a web3 platform as nfts. These spray cans are not just regular digitally painted spray cans, they will able to morph into his iconic spray paint drones that will allow the owner to take part in the creation of the Metacanvas. More over, generative poetry is injected by the drones into the animations in relation to monuments across the globe. According to Bestin.ua "KATSU aims to establish a democratic system for holders of THE DRONES as they will be able to freely display their works, then launch a voting system where they can agree on the final composition of the completed work to be auctioned.
The canvas will be its first, no other artist/s has executed a collaborative project of this nature at such a scale. The canvas will then be sold and the profits will be received by the collectors. i predict that many other web3 artists will try to replicate the idea as times progress. The artist continues to address ideas around authorship and human-machine relationships in this interactive crypto project. This project will play a huge role in the future of digital art, as it focuses on the collectors as artists, who will then be forging a digital creation alongside Katsu, that will be sold to the rest of the public. Katsubot is involving his supporters and collectors in this one massive project, that will not only benefit him but his collectors as well in a very contributive way. Its asif the attention is taken away from the artist but rather placed on the idea itself; The Metacanvas, which will forever live through out history as one of its kind. The artwork will be represented as a grand exhibit by its collectors. “The metaverse is less of a place, but a time when people value their digital assets more than their physical ones” KATSU told HypeArt. We need to go back to our history books and retrieve solid ideas that can help shape a better world and I think punk is one of those ideas, it was great, it was a community, it was a statement, let's stop the mainstream act and continue a legacy at which punks can be remembered in.
To see an artist transcend artistic barriers to level is pretty interesting in this day and age, especially since people are so used to seeing the same old, same old. Katsubot has always been an innovator within the art scene, I'm glad to see his work executed to this degree, especially since he is one of the people that Virgil Abloh had co-signed before his departure. click here to Read the article on their OFFKAT Art Fashion project.
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