Latest / TezTalks Radio - Tezos Ecosystem Podcast / 81: Agoria's Journey

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81: Agoria's Journey · TezTalks Radio - Tezos Ecosystem Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Tez Talks Radio.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: I am your host, marisa True, and this week I have a very special guest joining me.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: It's Sebastian De Vos, or more famously known as Agoria.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: So Agoria is a multifaceted creative.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: He is an artist, a composer and a DJ who is very prominent within the Tezos artverse, not only for his creations, but for his steadfast dedication to supporting artists within Web3.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: creations, but for his steadfast dedication to supporting artists within web3.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Hello, marisa.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for inviting me today.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: I guess I'm one of the every week special guests because I get everything.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Every week you have a special guest so glad to be part, to be part of your family now I think you've built an immense profile within the web3 space, not only for you know your vast collection of works, but just for the fact that you have a very clear sense and understanding of why the web three space is so pivotal for artists that are, you know, not only established, but also those that are attempting to build their names within this space.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: But before we get into that sort of storyline, I'd love to understand your own personal journey into blockchain and how you came to join not just you know the Web3 community, but Tezos specifically.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: So I was working a bit for the contemporary art field with artists.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: I was like helping for their own exhibitions, like, for example, philippe Barrenaud.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: I helped him for the tate modern exhibition in london or in armory park in new york, and I was.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: So I was already in inside the art world and I started to do my own um at that time, photography and films exhibition in paris or in miami-artel.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: And then the pandemic arrived and so as a DJ, of course I was just blocked at home and no more tour.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: And so I was already into the crypto scene, like being interested by the manifesto of Satoshi and the utopia about all the ecosystem.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: So I was thinking, okay, what could we do?
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: And at exactly the same time there's a friend of mine who is a French gallerist named Victor de Portalest, and with his husband, benjamin Aimer, they were asking me to do something in the hemp field, and the hemp field is the brother cannabis.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: And I was saying, okay, you know, all my childhood I play in rave parties, in fields or in abundant industry.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: And I was thinking maybe we could do something more specific than just me playing in in, just in a random place in a field.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: So we started with a biophysician named Nicolas Depra and a sound artist named Nicolas Becker, to imagine what we could do in this hemp field.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: So we started to do a radio, hemp FM, and then we did a movie about what was happening when we seed this field, and so we tried to analyze and to film in a laboratory in Paris, actually at the ENS in Paris.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: We tried to see what the microorganisms were looking like, and we had nothing for like maybe the first two months, and then suddenly we had like something interesting.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: So Nicolas Desprez de Bayeux-Ficin was like very desperate that we didn't catch anything interesting.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: And then, at the moment, everything appeared and from this movie named Phytocène was like for me a movie about the life, the essence of life, of the living, and something that we had never seen before.
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: Because even in the for nicolas, like what we, what we were seeing at during this movie, he didn't know how technically and how physically, organically, um it it was appearing.
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: So it was kind of a shock and so I was thinking, okay, how can we present this movie, how can we present this film to a larger audience, to wider audience?
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: During the pandemic, and we thought that the blockchain would be great and in a way to do the first NFT totally vegetal, vegetal NFT, let's say so.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: At that time I had no clue about Ikeknonk.
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: I had no clue about even I knew at that time super rare and very, very basic things like foundations.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: But we went through an auction house for Philips and it was my very first mint on the blockchain, but it was through a classic auction house and from that then I started to know everyone and then I felt into the love of minting and presenting works and all that.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: I guess we're going to speak today.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: But then I did my first other mints I think it was from foundations and then I went to Tezos.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: What was it about blockchain that made you think this is where we want to potentially experiment with distributing this film, Like you mentioned that you were genuinely curious about the space, but what was sort of that trigger moment that you thought this is how we want to try this, knowing that it was still fully experimental?
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: I guess because I wanted and this is actually also the day where biological generative art popped up in my mind I mean to merge the living, the complexity of the living systems and the code, because I was thinking like, of course, I won't teach anything here, but the living is a code by itself, it's ACGT, and so I was thinking to just to to mean a theme about the living and about the code into a code.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: That was.
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: That was making more sense than just showing this movie, I don't know, in Centre Pompidou or Palais de Tokyo in Paris or wherever a place that it should have been focused at that time.
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: But I was thinking, no, we need to show this movie through the blockchain and to make it like a digital NFT.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: And that was kind of a my approach to this and why I decided to show it through a blockchain more than into a gallery.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: But we, to be fair, we did show it also in a gallery in paris, um, also at that time, but just for very few, happy few and lucky few that they could, they could be able to visit during this period and what was sort of the experience of having that art received in two very different dimensions or very different realms, like what was the reception of it for your, I guess, the blockchain community, versus those that got to experience it within a gallery?
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: I think nobody knew anything.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: It was just the beauty of experimenting.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: That was the beauty of it.
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: And Philips gave us the whole auction house in Paris and we had a few weeks of exhibition there, also in London.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: But to me, the topic of just minting, let's say, a movie about cannabis, about hemp in the blockchain and actually seeing it's a seven minute movie and I think it's beautiful.
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: As far as I'm concerned, it's a beautiful movie to see how the living is in from the burst to the final explosion.
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: I think it's worse to be on the blockchain.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: To be honest, I think that's one of the themes and one of the projects I did that had to be on top of all on the blockchain.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: So then, learning from that experience, what else did blockchain enable you to do as an artist, as you began to experiment more creatively with various mediums?
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: What did blockchain enable you to do that perhaps you weren't as able to do as an artist before?
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: So there is all this, of course, this thing of being directly in connection, but I think nowadays we also see how difficult it is for most people, because when there is kind of a big audience bubble, everybody is looking at what you're doing and that looked kind of easy for maybe for many of the people just to show something, to get attention of it, and so the beauty of this is the instantaneity of showing art, because normally it could take a year or nine months or two years for a gallery, and then now, now you do work and you can show it very, very frankly.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: But the the the other side of the medal is that from most of the artists, it's important to to take time and to digest and to overthink what you're doing before to present it.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: So all the cycle that we are experiencing now, I think it's a good thing, as difficult as it can be.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: I think it's a good thing for the artist and for the whole ecosystem.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: It's actually a very normal cycle to go through all this period and I think that artists that will manage to and I know it's difficult artists that will manage to get relevant over the years using blockchain will have a strong, strong, strong community and a strong impact on art history Right.
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: I mean.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: I'm still in a little age.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: So on the one hand, it bridged the relationship between the artists and their audience, but it also accelerated their ability.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Art became a much more instantaneous thing.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: But you were saying that the counterpoint to that was that sometimes it's actually worth slowing down.
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: So the market cycle has sort of forced the pace and kind of made everyone recalibrate the momentum a little bit and so that they could actually be a little bit more thoughtful, a little bit more mindful about the art that they put out, which is interesting because Tezos obviously had this massive boom of art since 2021 and basically the first NFT boom, and then, over the course of the bear market, we saw, I guess, mints slow down a little bit, but it never really stopped for the artists.
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: So what was that experience for you, as a core member of the Tezos art community, of creating during this quiet period?
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: So I can only speak for myself, because there is no one artist.
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: Every artist are very different in every stories every.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: So for my own perspective, like when I want to present something, I want this to be the final piece, not a work in progress, not a sketch, not an idea of something that could be developed.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: But for other artists, the blockchain, the ikegnunc and tesos was also a way of funding projects by showing work in progress and sketches and and ideas and developing their skills.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: So it's it's very different.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: I mean, every artist gets different um angles about how they can use the blockchain.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: Um, for me, it's like you know, of course, and even more than in any gallery, what you will present will last as long as internet will exist.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: Also, it's a question that I like to provocate many times is, like, is internet granted?
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: Because I think like more and more you know, like if you think about the history of memory and how the piece were like lasting during the years, if you think about centuries ago, the draw in the in the caves we are still here if you think about the painters for impressionism we will speak later about this from this period, like we need to to restore them, like I don't know if it's all.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Restore.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Actually we need to do.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: We say that in English restoration.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: Well guys, you will find out.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: Restore and Restore and preserve.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: Restore and preserve.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: You know, after a few decades, I think.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: Nowadays, cds after 24, 30 years are not working correctly.
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: So what will be the future of blockchain and the preservation of art on the blockchain if countries stop access to internet?
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: I think for everyone in their minds, internet is granted, I'm not sure it is 100%, and I'm not sure even if we have protocols with Arweave or other companies to store the art.
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: We don't know, and I think it's a good question also to point.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's a very important philosophical notion, because everyone speaks of blockchain as essentially creating a level of permanence to anything that is digital, but then when you also consider it against the backdrop of, I guess, like technological obsolescence, like our devices change all the time, systems upgrade all the time and something is always lost in every iteration.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: So I agree with you that to assume that this is all granted and this is all permanent isn't necessarily an actual guarantee.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: So, with that in mind, has that impacted your work at all, or how has your view of your work evolved over the last couple of years as you continue to experiment with this idea of digital permanence?
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: I think it's the core of all my work is like we speak about digital permanence, but I would like to speak about life permanence, working with biologists, with physicists and with people who are doing, like fundamental research about DNA.
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: And you know, like there is one thing that I love to say is that the approach we're having about technology is one that will merge with the living, and this is all my work is to tend like, because we tend to oppose always the physical and the digital, to oppose the code and the complexity of the living, and I feel they will tend to merge each other.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: So that's an intuition, of course, and I'm not sure I will see it during my life, but there is something that is here that reminds me all these approaches like I was working with the biologist, alice Meunier about a project named Centriole, and I was always questioning myself about how we managed to take a decision, how do we manage to to this, to say this word and to show my hands, and so I was working with her and she did a research about what's happening in the brain before we snap a decision, and actually it's incredible.
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: The biology of this decision, of what's happening, is we have a kind of a water in the brain and in this water we have like proteins and there is cilias, like who makes the water moving in the brain, you know, and the protein is one is attached to different ports.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: Then when both match, then you take a decision and the cilia is pushing this decision.
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: So it's like it's.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: I mean, all these proteins are matching together.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: All this evolution pushes us to do things.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: It's something that is very organized in a way.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: It's very organized.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: In a way it's very coded, and so this is a vertiginous question.
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: I wish I could have some answers during the next 30 years, but this is really all the work I'm doing.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: And so when I started to work about Orsay because when Orsay saw this series, it was on SuperRare.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: When they saw this series, that's the moment they called me to say, hey, we would love to see what could be your vision about our collections and we would like to do a project together.
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: So I said okay, but I don't want to.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: Of course I said okay, but I don't want to.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: Of course I said okay, but I didn't want to to show art through screens in the in Arsène museum because, like it's, it's actually a museum, of course, of modernity.
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: But there is.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: There are no screens at all to show.
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: You know, like showing my work about the living into screens in this temple of sculpture and paintings would have been a bit like not let's say not relevant.
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: The project I did in Orsay Museum was to think about the breeze, the vital essence of life, and to know how we could use this breeze to show art.
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: And so all these ideas to.
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: Maybe we can speak now about this, but all this idea about having a sculpture and blowing into your phone to show art came from this idea of, okay, how can we implement the living into history of impressionism but still be in the core direction of all the works I'm doing with Johan and another artist.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: But there was one screen actually during the exhibition, only one, but this one was to show the living, the real living, and we encoded the life of Courbet into a bioreactor full of yeast and the yeast were doing the artwork.
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: So I mean the yeast were making data to make the artwork relevant.
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: So this one justified to use a screen.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: I mean I think your, you know your performance.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: Sorry, I'm going in many directions.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: No, you touched on a lot of really important themes, because I think your performance or your exhibition at Musee d'Orsay was a landmark moment.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: It was this meeting of the worlds between traditional and digital creativity, but also this organic matter, like almost themes of memento mori, but in a much more unique and fundamental way, because it was to do with, like core organic matter, um, and I think it's.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: You know, we touched upon impressionism a few comments back, and so there's a lot of infusions of different disciplines when it comes to how you'd like to convey your message through your work.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: So how did you actually?
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: What was the thinking process like of reconciling all of these different themes and ideas?
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: Oh, but it comes after two years of work.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: You know I was speaking before about digestion of ideas and taking the time of thinking if the project is right and changing it, because we change a project two, three times during this period, yeah, I think.
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: Also, the museum contacted me two years ago almost now, even a bit more and so we were visiting a lot and speaking with conservators, with curators of the museum, knowing a bit more about every incredible paints that were here.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: It was very, you know, like sometimes I was spending my nights there let's say, my evenings when the museum is closed and it was a fantastic moment Because, like you know, it felt really like surrounded by so many souls around, like I'm a big fan of altered state of consciousness and I did many experiences on myself and when I was there, I was like, really, I was really tripping by night or by evening.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: So this project were to be art, music and technology and blockchain.
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: That was all together.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: That was the meaning of the project.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: I was working on some artwork with some researchers.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: Some people were working at Saclay in the Center Atomic Research in Paris, some others were like the director of fundamental research in Museum of Histoire Naturelle in Paris, and so it was a big team of people where we were having a lot of drinks by night, thinking about what do we believe about life?
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: Should we embed this incredible paints into the work we're doing with yeast?
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: And you know, like they asked me to, to inaugurate the bioreactor and just like the function, the yeast into the bioreactor was like another incredible moment and and to okay what will be the history we will do so.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: They were like the piece about the, the piece about courbet movie that we, we were working with this bioreactor.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: They were the, the piece I did with johannes cure about the sculpture and and the moment where you blow into your phone.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: And they were the piece about, um, me playing by night inside the museum in the nave, at the center of the nave, uh, where people could dance, uh with, uh, I don't know, rodin sculptures, courbet paintings, um, that I was very scared for this one.
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: Very scared Because, like just the day before, virginie Donzo, who was like the commissar of the exhibition, the curator, she told me like, oh, you know, the last acquisition of the museum is this piece, this sculpture, and I think it costed 31 millions of euros, and then I calculate that maybe there were 200 sculptures around me in this place and I don't know if someone pushed something or if the vibration of the music I mean, I was like hopefully everything will go well, otherwise, you know, from an amazing idea, an amazing project, then the DJ would destroy the museum and then I was like a bit scared about that.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: But in the end it all went well and I think it was a very important moment, not only for me but also for them Also, for because many artists were there, many curators and many people from it was during NFT Paris, so many people were actually here and it was a really, really good moment to see that If I was on stage.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: It was also a moment where it federates for all the scene, that you know, all what we were working being, let's say, validated by institution.
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: It was something that, at a point where we could do this party inside, you know, like that was kind of a special moment.
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: And the fourth piece I did during this exhibition was a track I did with Nile Rodgers and Madison McFerrin.
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: It was a song dedicated about this idea of gateway, because it was.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: For me, the piece we did with Johan Leeskeur was kind of an arch, a Tampala arch, where we could reconnect with artists and painters of the museum.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Arch, where we could reconnect with artists and painters of the museum.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean it was an incredible, incredible moment.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: I mean I can imagine that it must have been quite surreal to not only have your works exhibited but then to also have the opportunity to perform another discipline of your work, which is music, in such a historical institution.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: I think all of us would be a little bit anxious about, you know, the crowds that would come and how they would essentially interact with the works that they are surrounded by, and hopefully no one knocks anything over by accident.
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: But I can imagine that must have been, you know, a major milestone, just not in your professional career, but also just your life.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: I think it's an incredible honor.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: But then I want to go back to this idea of the museum allowed everyone to drink alcohol.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: There was a bar.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: That's what blows my mind, that's the risky that I think, when you introduce the variable like alcohol into that sort of environment, because that's when you have a greater potential for accidents.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: I guess, Historically in the last few years and again, as you said, historical with a little age there was a resistance between traditional financial institutions and the Web3 art world whether it qualified as art, whether crypto had a space within the art world, and there was a lot of debate and it seems like we've now come to a point where there is this common respect and understanding between these two domains, this common respect and understanding between these two domains.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: So how have you seen that evolve over time in terms of, I guess, the institutional acceptance of these digital forms of art as they exist as NFTs?
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Maybe I think the institution always defend digital art.
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: I don't think I think the Institute always defended digital art.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: I think it was not really a subject.
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: I think, to be honest, the Institute always defended digital art.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: The thing is, it was more about what people are saying.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: It's not about defending NFT or digital art.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: It's more about defending emergent artists who are not in the system.
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: That's much more what happened and not coming through the classical you know, bozard is cool and galleries representing and all the.
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: That was actually what happened and so it's not Everybody is saying, yeah, wow, incredible NFT in our institute.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: I think digital art is inside any institution for so many years.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: So I don't think it's really digital art.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: That has been.
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: It's more a way of saying, okay, nowadays, art scene is evolving as music has evolved in the past, and it's like much easier for an artist to to show his skills or or or or his heart and to to make his message relevant.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: For institutions, it's much more that.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: So, yes, of course NFT blockchain helped it, but it's not about well, finally, institutions are defending digital art.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: They do for years.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: There's nothing new in this, but I'm super happy to see that, of course, orsay gave me this opportunity, that Refik and Adol did it in MoMA and that St Pompidou or LACMA acquired pieces.
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: I think it's fantastic news for every artist that it's kind of, let's say, a hope in this momentum.
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: So of course, we are all positive about this.
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: So then, going back to your own work, and I read that some have dubbed it biological, generative art, and, as you were alluding to earlier, arguably all of nature is generative because it's all based off of the same baseline code ACTG what makes our DNA?
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: So how have you continued to connect with that concept past your initial works?
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Is this a theme that carries through all of your works, or what are some of the other themes and areas that you're exploring?
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: So in music I don't use it so far, but maybe I could actually.
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: You know there was the track YMCA, maybe I could do.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: Actually, you know um, there is.
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: There were the track y m c, maybe I could do like a c, g.
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know, it's a big joke, but maybe one day I will do a track like also um.
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: So the my, I will keep working with.
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: We have like two or three projects like about collaboration, and I will keep doing this because this is actually what drives me, it's like to I'm an artist not to solve questions but to get more questions, I guess you know.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: So every time we work on projects, it's like we have another project coming and it's you know, this is the problem.
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: Every time we work on projects, it's like we have another project coming and it's, you know, this is the problem.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: Every time we work on something, then we have like 10 or more ideas to that are consequent of this, of this project.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: So one project that I'm really excited about to work soon is a work I do with hospital here and where I will I mean, I can't say too much now, but it's something that will, I think, embed what is the essence and the beauty of life, but intrinsically so yeah, this is what I'm about.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: I feel I'm about to feel and in terms of the fact that you explore so many different disciplines and also digital mediums, how critical is the blockchain component to all of your work?
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: Is it sort of this domain of experimentation where you also see part of your work existing beyond it, or do you think that now there's always going to be this permanent infusion of this technology into your work?
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: Thanks to blockchain, first, for me, If there were no blockchain, Orsay would have never contacted me, and if you know like it helps a lot artists to get like a really a strong direction to be recognized.
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: I feel, and that's why you know, many artists are contacting me like, how did it happen?
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: And we would love to be part of the next exhibition and, and we want to propose things and but of course, it's not the artist who will call the museum.
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: I mean, or maybe it can happen, I don't know, but I wouldn't feel calling I don't know Tate Modern or Metropolitan.
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: Hey, I have an exhibition for you, so it's.
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: I think that's why I'm advising for many contacting me now.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: It's like, keep doing what you feel it's, it's your, it's your strong, uh message and and definitely, um, you have a chance one day that it will be remarked.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: There's one thing that I'm a bit um, uh, sometimes suspected is uh, uh, let's not, let's, let's not, let's, let's not.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: Maybe let's not dive too much in this, but, um, artists should, should, take the time to what I was saying at the at the initial, should really take the time to um, not to overmint and to and to think twice before, before presenting the arts on the blockchain.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: So there's, still.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: For example, for a curator watching, in a way, your portfolio on Tezos, on Object, on FXH or wherever.
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: If you do two or three things that are really out of the scope or are really not accurate, that could also change the vision about your all, all other artworks, even if all those are great.
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: For example, I did very bad tracks in my life, but after 30 years we mostly remember the good ones.
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: So you know, like it's only four or five years, I'm not speaking about the birth of digital art, but this, this scene, this the scene we are speaking here, this, uh, it's five, six years of of life.
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: It's really really, really new.
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: It's just the birth of it.
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: So when we speak about evolution, about this, it's just just getting started.
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: So I guess, in that sense, don't be too much in a rush.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a value to scarcity that still exists, or at least you know before.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: You should self-curate the work that you actually put out there, to basically deliver your work with a certain level of intent, rather than just trying to produce as much as possible for the sake of you know, as much attention or traffic or exposure as possible online Is that sort of what you're driving at.
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: To basically bring a level of mindfulness to the exercise and realize that this is just because the Internet is a limitless space does not mean that there is space for limitless works.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: There should be intent and purpose behind what you produce and what you choose to publish, otherwise I guess it all gets sort of lost in the noise 100 percent yeah I also think it's very interesting, just because you said much better than I.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: With my english, you said much better than I no, I I mean, I wouldn't have been able to phrase it without your input.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: I wanted to go back to one of the points you raised earlier, which was this idea of we cannot take the permanence of the internet for granted, communities that exist on it, and sort of where it begins and where it ends, which, I guess, is what drove me to ask you, you know, do you, do you see blockchain as a permanent feature of all of your work going forward?
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: Um, is there a, is there a sort of a limit to the relationship of where blockchain can work with your art and, if so, where is it?
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: Or is this something where there's always just going to be this permanent fusion, where there should always be some kind of digital representation of the work, even if it's not a part of the piece itself, but just, I guess you know, the proof of provenance of it?
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: it's funny you're saying this because um, one of the orcepis, sigma Lumina, so the sculpture.
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: Initially, with Johan Lescaut, we wanted to and it was his first desire actually to Johan when we were speaking about this culture was this culture to be a sovereign network by itself.
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: So we wanted this culture even if internet were, for example, I don't know cut it and not work, work anymore.
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: The sovereign network of the structure would keep working.
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: We wanted this culture to be um, disconnected for every um, um, every um, not utility, but every life outside of the museum.
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: And we didn't do it because it was then difficult to mint on Tessos as an example, but it was really something that we really wanted to achieve.
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: So I'm sure that we will do few pieces in the future where the piece itself would be a sovereign network, not connected to internet and not connected to and I think that gives kind of some.
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: You know, like this culture was like the light turning around and when the light were turning around, the shadow on the floor we're drawing a QR code that you had to flash and we'd love to imagine and I would love to decline this culture to do it, for example, outside by the sun, where the sun is turning around the sculpture and the sun is throwing on the floor the cure, not the light, not an artificial light, but the sun itself, and this way, the solar network would be like a forever peace, and this is something that I'm really, really into so it's almost like immortalizing it through nature rather than trying to immortalize it through technology.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think also what's interesting about the idea of if you know if it was like a digital sovereign network or a platform.
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: It's also an interesting concept because, arguably, the thing that keeps things visible and alive online or digitally is the network is the fact that there are so many different connected devices people, audiences that essentially bring or keep something in existence.
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: So when you remove that, it raises this whole other question about what is permanence if there is no one else to prop it up or to validate that permanence.
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: So again, it's a very existential rabbit hole that I think a lot of your work explores, and I'm not surprised that this is what continues to inspire you, just because I don't think that there is a finite, tangible answer to any of it.
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: It's only worth exploring exactly.
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: With that being said, what else are you working on at the moment?
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: What are you experimenting with now?
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: um, at the right moment.
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: Is my new album coming out?
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: Uh, in september, but there are many.
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: The thing is, my exhibitions are taking like a year or two years of work, so we are working on different exhibitions now.
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: What I wish also is to if some curators of museums watch this.
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: I wish Sigma Illumina to travel all around the world, because I think it's something that would be very nice.
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: You know, like, some museums contacted us in Korea or in Dubai.
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: Also, it could be with impressionism pieces, but it could be with the DNA of the museum too, because we can adapt the output of the artworks depending on every museum.
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: So that's something that I'm really into at the moment and I'm like, I'm just back from Vatican city.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: I was at the academic science of Vatican the last week with Ina Moja, who organized this, and and there is a nice project coming from this too it was, you know, whatever the.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: You know you could feel that I don't believe much in gods and and and, of course, doing all this research.
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: Then that can only be my answer.
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: But when you go to vatican city and you're surrounded by all this um, uh, energy, like, whatever, whatever your faith and belief, there is something happening to you and this pushes you to create new projects that we will try to defend some causes with our artworks.
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: That was kind of a beautiful moment last week, yeah.
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: So it's kind of like you know, regardless of your spiritual disposition, what you again?
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: you know when I speak what a year.
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: You know it was like awesome.
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: I spoke to United Nations a year ago, then now I was in the Vatican city.
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: It's like it's an incredible year.
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: It's a massive journey.
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: You were speaking before about about blockchain and what it can enable, and how important was it to your life.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: I mean, the answer is incredible.
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: I think that's what's so exciting is that, you know, just a couple of years ago, a lot of these conversations would have revolved around what is it that you're doing and why does it matter?
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: And now that sort of the technological component sort of speaks for itself, and now it's much closer to the, the purpose-driven element of your work rather than the means of getting there.
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: Blockchain is sort of the default infrastructure and everything else you build atop it is the thing that carries meaning.
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: And alluding to what you're saying about, um, the vatican city, and you know you may not necessarily be of a religious disposition, but this perhaps was another experiment in expanding consciousness.
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: Uh, in a way, and you know, there's always an element of these environments that can give you a sense of appreciation, for I almost like the principle of grand design, whether it's attached to a religious discipline or just the fact that you know we see code occurring naturally in our organic earth, and then how we're mapping that onto technologies and mapping it back to nature is just a very profound thing to explore.
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: So I think there's just it's a very magical realm to me.
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree, I agree very magical realm to me.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree, I agree.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: Well, it sounds like you have a lot of work coming up over the next year or two.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: Um, I think the whole tesla's community is going to continue to watch.
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: You've been one of the, I guess like the major figures within the art community I have to say, the support of the tesla's community um helped a lot Artists and collectors incredible.
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: I do feel like the support of the Tessus Foundation should go to artists that make this blockchain alive.
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: This is very important.
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: I know this topic has been debated so many times, but still I feel like there is so many gaps between amount of money spent in various way that has not been very accurate regarding all the work that artists and passion of artists made into this blockchain.
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: And some collectors have been like leaving the space because because of this and I think artists can be also sometimes demoralized and felt abandoned.
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: So the importance of, I guess, the distribution of resources that people know are available and making sure they go to the domains that matter, and the arts being a major one of them.
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: I mean, teso's blockchain is alive mainly because of the art community, so I think this committee should be listened to and be part of the conversation.
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of the debate exists online and it's a matter of the right people paying attention, those with the actual control, to be able to make that change, to respond to, I guess, the increasing pressure around the fact that more resources, more support needs to go to the domains that are really keeping this community alive, and it is so important because art and culture are worth everything in society at the end of the day.
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: Just to tie up loose ends before we part ways today.
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: I'd love to ask you know, if there's anyone who's sort of seeking more information about your work, whether it's past, present or future?
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: Where can they go to learn more?
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: So if you want to see the piece on Tessos, you can go to fabulousobjectcom and FXH, and otherwise I have a website, but I don't think it's very.
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: actually, let's update the website and then that would be the answer so you let us know once the website is updated, and then we'll redirect everyone there otherwise.
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: No, you can go on all social networks and I try to be as available as possible.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: Seb, thank you so much for all of your perspectives.
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: Today it was really fascinating to learn about your work and also just your perspectives of the interplay between nature and technology, and hopefully it won't be too long before we speak again, so thank you.
• 45:14
  Speaker 2: Thank you, marisa, I'll speak very soon.