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Who

Original Wheeler is a New Media Arts studio founded by me, Visual artist Drew Wheeler (b. 1989), merging traditional art making methods with robotics, AI and Web3 (NFT).

‍Hallucinations AI, is a series of physical paintings linked 1-to-1 with unique NFTs on the Ethereum Blockchain.

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What

I wanted to create a framework and UX for my visual arts website that allows collectors to purchase, sell and trade my physical artworks through dedicated NFTs.

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How

I used Unreal Engine and Adobe Suite to create 3D renderings of each physical artwork as NFTs. Each artwork has a dedicated page on my website that connects to a custom Node.js server to manage blockchain data and provide token-gated privileges for the artwork owner. Artwork owners can use their NFT to login on my website and make public posts about their conditions of future sales. Prospective buyers can communicate directly with the artwork owner via Converse Messenger encrypted blockchain chat.

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Why

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• According to Statista, high-net-worth art collectors today predominately invest in physical paintings and drawings; With NFT / digital art collection in its infancy, I feel that this is an area worth exploring - how to connect physical paintings and drawings with NFTs and onboard high-net-worth art collectors to the Web3 (NFT) space.

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• DTC benefits: traditional art brokers charge artists 30% or more in commission to sell artwork through galleries, while NFT marketplaces, like OpenSea.io, typically charge creators around 3% or less from each sale.

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• NFTs can include creator royalties, meaning that each time an NFT is resold, a percentage of the sale is automatically sent to the original creator's Web3 blockchain wallet. This helps artists continue to profit from their work each time it is resold in a maketplace.

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