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thefunnyguys: Hello everybody, welcome to our space. It's my pleasure to host this discussion to celebrate one year of Le Random. It feels more like five years to us, to be honest, but we did the maths and it actually is only one year.
I'm here with the rest of the Le Random team. There is Zach Taylor, who is the co-founder of Le Random. He spearheads everything on the operational and financial side. There's also Peter Bauman, who you guys probably know as Monk Antony. He's our editor in chief. He's responsible for our editorial, also for the timeline of generative art history that we're producing. And just today he published a new article, by the way, called Demystifying Generative Aesthetics. So make sure to go to our editorial and check it out. And then last but not least, I'm also here with Conrad. Conrad is the collection lead at Le Random and I have the pleasure to work together with Conrad on a day to day basis to build out our collection.
So the plan for today is to discuss a few different topics. First of all, we will discuss one year of Le Random, some highlights of the team, some favorite pieces we have collected. Peter will take care of that part in a few minutes. Then there's also the current markets, which we would like to have a discussion about. And then the final 15 minutes are reserved to do a Q&A. I'll hand it over to Peter to start the one year of Le Random discussion.
Peter Bauman: Thank you, thefunnyguys. And thank you, everybody, for joining us today. And if you have the chance, read the article, Demystifying Generative Aesthetics. Thank you very much.
So the first thing we're going to talk about is looking back at one year of Le Random and celebrating it and talking about some of our highlights, what we've loved the last year. The first thing we're going to talk about is the favorite piece that Le Random has collected over the last year. Why don't we start with Conrad? How about you? Can you tell us, please, what is your favorite piece that Le Random has collected? And what are some of the highlights that Le Random has collected over the last year?
Conrad House: That's a tough one. I was honestly not hoping to go first on this because I think I'm probably the most indecisive one here. Obviously, working with the collection every day, it's kind of hard to choose a favorite. It's like the generic term that you can't choose a favorite child. But there's so many artists and commissioned work that we've done and groups of sets that we've collected that I'm so happy with, like Travis Smalley, all of our Helena Sarin pieces, Iskra, the Cypher Genome.
But I think when it comes down to picking a favorite, two come to mind. The first one being 36 Points by Sage Jenson. This has been a project that I think on its initial release I was always fascinated with. I was always a big fan of Sage Jenson's work. And this collection from Feral File is something that I can really sit with for a long time, be really immersed into it. It's deeply mesmerizing to go through these 36 points throughout the keyboard and see these different compositions that form from this biological growth algorithm. And it's a piece that I think is a highlight piece that I try to show to anybody that wants to see what generative art can be. 36 Points, I think, is something that a lot of people can find themselves getting lost in.
And I think besides that piece, it's probably going to be Seeds of Seeds by Sofia Crespo. This was a piece that I had long admired from Sofia and was arguably one of my favorite works that she had ever created. And it was always something that, when going through her list of works, I've always stopped and spent more time with. So when the opportunity arose for us to bring this to the collection, it was one of the biggest no-brainers on our end. And it's still a piece that I admire very deeply. And I think it's very reminiscent of Sofia's creative practice and how she sees the world as building blocks of so many other things. And this piece is representative of that, as this collaged floral AI piece that is built upon other AI images of itself, that evolves through this rhythmic breathing motion. And it's a piece that, again, like 36 Points, whenever it comes across my eye, I have to spend the next five to 10 minutes just really appreciating it.
But yeah, maybe we can ask thefunnyguys next what he thinks is his favorite piece from this past year.
Peter Bauman: Sure. And I'd also like to hear about, Conrad, how do you think those pieces are connected? Because they both do have something to do with artificial life. One of them is AI. One of them is procedural. Do you see them as connected in any way?
Conrad House: Definitely. I think they both explore the idea of speculative biological technology in a way, both creating these digital ecosystems that breed new kinds of creatures within them, of themselves. So I think they're very linked in some way. And I think this underlying theme of biological systems is another thing that we see in so many other works that I have a strong appreciation for, and maybe is some of my favorite kind of biases of work that I really enjoy.
Peter Bauman: Artificial life is some of my favorite work as well. So I hear Karl Sims, lots of names there. thefunnyguys, do you want to tell us about your favorites?
thefunnyguys: Yeah, sure. I would actually go back to one of the first pieces that we added to the collection. And this was also a beautiful testimonial to the support we got from the community, even before going public, before announcing that Le Random was a thing. Because even before, we already had the chance to collect a piece of generative art history, created by Herbert Franke in 1979. The piece is called Mondrian. And the NFT that we collected is an excerpt of Mondrian. It's a video recording of the original piece, running for, I think it's 20 to 30 minutes, live on a machine.
But originally the piece was created in 1979 for the first home computer that Texas Instruments produced. Texas Instruments Germany actually reached out to Herbert Franke and they asked if he could put an interactive software art piece on every single home computer that Texas Instruments distributed in Germany. Which is totally mind-blowing to me, that in 1979 on all of these machines, people could interact with generative art. And there was this endlessly generating visual piece, also with an audio component to it. And the piece is called Mondrian. It was directly inspired by the work of Piet Mondrian.
And I think it's one of the most significant pieces we have in our collection. And it also fits really well within our team, within our mission. We really hope to show that generative art is a movement that has been around for many decades, that it's not a short hype in the NFT space. And I think with this piece by Herbert Franke, we really collected a piece of generative art history.
Peter Bauman: It's a really good choice. And Zach, do you want to tell us about your favorite?
Zach Taylor: It kind of follows the same line of thought as what thefunnyguys was just saying about collecting, or making a collection or making a landmark in history. For me, the addition to the collection would be RGB #1, contributed by Seifert himself. Firstly, for me, it's very visually appealing. Secondly, maybe on a more philosophical standpoint, it being the genesis piece in the series, as well as being minted directly by Seifert himself. And then, in a roundabout way, contributed by Seifert himself. So I think that kind of hit the team, that we were kind of not making history, but this would be something we'd all look back on and be proud of ourselves in a way, and relished the opportunity there.
We also did showcase RGB #1 in our exhibition, our first solo exhibition that Le Random did, in Taiwan at the back end of last year, which was an amazing event. It pulled in a great crowd. And we coupled that, the RGB #1, with one of our Chromie Squiggles. So it was a really nice narrative that we had. And it was very nice to see in person.
So yeah, I think that would be my favorite, in inverted commas. Appreciate it's extremely difficult to pick a piece within our collection, but there you have it. Peter, maybe I'll throw it back to you. What's your favorite, your most memorable piece so far in the collection?
Peter Bauman: Thank you, Zach. And another excellent choice. So my favorite piece, I went a little bit obscure, but I do think it is my favorite piece. It's Golan Levin's Polygona Nervosa. It is a really awesome piece for a lot of reasons. It's gestural. It's interactive. It's from 1997 when Golan was working on his master's thesis at MIT. It's just a really fun piece too. You can mint it on Tezos. It's an edition piece. It's not a one-of-one. It's not something we paid a huge amount of money for. Individual collectors could easily buy it.
But I just think it's a really awesome piece for a lot of reasons. It's weird, it's animated, it's interactive and it really shows a lot about Golan and his personality and where he's going. Especially if you look at work he's done recently, like Cytographia and all the work that he's done with Blobs.
So that's, again, what I love about it. What I kind of wrote about today, about appreciating elements of the digital aesthetic and the digital language, it very much does that with its interactivity and gestural basis. It's tactile. It's animated and it's basically infinite as well. So it really hits on some of the areas and elements of the digital that I love, and that's why it's my favorite piece of Le Random's.
Okay, so the next part is we are going to talk about our favorite articles. My little thing that I do at Le Random. So very curious to hear what you guys have to say about your favorite articles. Maybe we can start with thefunnyguys this time. What is your favorite article?
thefunnyguys: Yeah, sure. It's actually good that we have Lenny, Leander Herzog, in the crowd, because I need to go for AGH. I think when we started with the editorial at Le Random, the goal was always to foster debates, to make sure people talk about generative art in a more elevated way, talking more about higher concepts and having a good discussion about generative art. I think with AGH, with this interview, we really managed to do that. People talked about the article for a while. It was also one of our most read pieces that we published so far. And it's also thanks to Leander. He had some spicy takes. He always does. It's one of my favorite articles. And still every now and then I hear people talk about it, or I see it pop up on the timeline. So yeah, I need to go with AGH.
Peter Bauman: That is a good choice. And I think it was one of the ones that resonated the most with our readers. And it was really exciting to talk to them about that, and then to also be able to attend it the day it came out. It was really a fun kind of congruence there. How about Zach? Do you want to tell us about your favorite piece?
Zach Taylor: Sure. I think my favorite piece so far, and again, favorite in inverted commas, there's so many good pieces on there, would probably be one of the early ones, Peter, that you published. It was your framework, Demystifying Generative Art. And for those that haven't read it, definitely go take a read. It's a very concise framework on how people can think about and interpret generative art. I think Peter attempts to tackle some very subtle and possibly contentious questions in the space, which I think he handles very well. And I think it being quite approachable for those generative art experts out there as well as generative art newbies, I think it's a great place to start, a great place to revisit. I would also say part two has just landed, and I appreciate the guys have already mentioned that. But yeah, I'd be interested, though.
Peter Bauman: Like choosing a child. But for me, it was the Illuminating Marfa piece by Nathaniel Stern. So Nathaniel Stern is this awesome, amazing writer that I somehow convinced to write an article for Le Random. And I just love the piece. It's about his time at Marfa, and it's about his experience with a piece that was really profound for him. And he reached out to me about it. And Nathaniel is just a voice that I really respect. And I mean, he's written in several publications that are important to me as a writer and as just an appreciator of art, like Christiane Paul's A Companion to Digital Art. And I really appreciated him writing for us. And I thought that piece was really smart and fun, and a celebration of what I also love about art, and Jason Ting, who's also awesome. So also, I really, really want to go to Marfa. And I think anybody who reads it would feel that way too. So yeah, check it out.
How about you, Conrad? What is your favorite piece?
Conrad House: Yeah, maybe before I say my favorite, I think there's a couple of honorable mentions. I think the Linda Dounia article, Memory Machines, is a really fantastic one, and I think really helps contextualize why Linda creates her work, and it's really lovely.
But if I had to pick a favorite, it's probably the Zach Lieberman articles that we have, both of them, the first one being The Resonance of Generative Art, and then the second one being the commission article that we released alongside the commission, where Zach dives into each of the commission pieces and explains a bit more of why he created them, how he created them and how they relate to his entire career. But specifically in The Resonance of Generative Art, there's some really great references to art and music that I really appreciate personally, that I find really fond and love reading about.
And then I think one of my favorite quotes of all time is in the commission article, where Zach Lieberman relates himself to being a wildlife photographer of mathematics, which I think is a perfect analogy for what he does. And it's just something that has stuck really close, and something that I always go back and remember and think about specific topics that were mentioned and brought up. But I think those are probably my favorite, any of the Zach Lieberman writings. It's always great to listen to him, and even better to read what he has to say about the space and his work.
Peter Bauman: Yeah, definitely. Those are some of my favorite conversations. I definitely agree with that.
“And then I think one of my favorite quotes of all time is in the commission article, where Zach Lieberman relates himself to being a wildlife photographer of mathematics, which I think is a perfect analogy for what he does.” — Conrad House 17:20
Okay, so the last question for the panel here, reflecting on one year of Le Random, is talking about just any other highlight from the last year. Could be anything really, but a personal, professional, Le Random-related highlight over the last year.
So I guess now it's maybe my turn to go first. My highlight is probably just in general the Bright Moments events that I've been able to go to. I think they've been a lot of fun. I've been able to meet a lot of people in real life. I've met a lot of artists. I think that Argentina was a lot of fun. It was just remote and weird and small and a lot of fun. But I think the highlight for me was probably Bright Moments Tokyo. That was almost a year ago at this point, which is quite interesting to think about. But Le Random was very young. We had just launched on Twitter, but nobody really knew who we were at that point. So it was a lot of fun to still be quite under the radar. And it was just a lot of fun in terms of the people that were there, the city. I think the sentiment at that time was quite positive. And I have a lot of good memories from that trip. But that's a very tough one to think about, highlights over the last year.
So how about you, Zach? What is your highlight over the last year?
Zach Taylor: My highlight over the last year: as thefunnyguys said at the start, the last year has felt like five, so there's many to pick from. But I mentioned it earlier, I think it would be our first solo exhibition in Taiwan, Influencia. And I suppose it's only right to give Volume DAO a quick shout out. They were absolutely sensational with the collaboration we had with them, helping us set up the exhibition and so on and so forth.
But yeah, I think it kind of hit when we arrived, helped set everything up and, as I said earlier, managed to draw in a great crowd. It really introduced us to the world around Le Random and its pieces. It was a great moment. And yeah, we're super excited to have plans in the pipeline for many more of them, so long may that continue.
thefunnyguys, maybe I'll throw it to you. What was your personal highlight from the year so far?
thefunnyguys: Yeah, sure. It's not an easy question to tackle because a lot happens in this year, and I'm grateful for all of it. But one thing that I do look back on with a smile is the support we got from the very first moments, even before Le Random was public. As I mentioned, we were able to acquire Mondrian by Herbert Franke before going public. We were interviewing Casey Reas and Zach Lieberman before Le Random was a thing. We were able to commission artworks from people like Casey before Le Random really was a thing. And I just look back and think, whoa, we had their support from the start. They believed in us from the start, which is a really good feeling.
And same with Peter and Conrad. They joined the team also when everything was still just not established yet the way it is now. Same with our advisory board: Jason Bailey, Artnome, Georg Bak and Spalter, from the very first day. And without the support of the community, of everyone, Le Random wouldn't have become a thing. So I'm really grateful for the support from even day minus one, let's say.
Peter Bauman: Really nicely put. And how about you, Conrad? What is your highlight?
Conrad House: I think you kind of touched on it, but Bright Moments Tokyo was a great event. Thinking about that time specifically, the Asakura House event that Bright Moments Tokyo put on was fascinating, and seeing the contrast of this digital art displayed in this very culturally significant, historically significant space was inviting.
But I think a big thing outside of that, and maybe IRL specific moments, is the talks we've been able to have with certain pioneers. It has been really mind-blowing, and it is an understatement to say it's an honor to be able to speak with some of the people like Copper Giloth and David Em and Dan Sandin with our '80s talk, and Joan Truckenbrod, and so many of these incredible artists that I would have never thought I'd have the chance to be even in the same room as, but let alone have these hour-long discussions about generative art history and where we are in the contemporary space.
And I think it's something that in five to 10 years I'll look back on and be super memorable, that I was able to have even just the shortest moment with some of these hugely influential figures that have paved the way to providing Le Random an opportunity to do what we do in this day and age. But yeah, I think that's probably the most memorable thing, is the talks with the pioneers that we've got to have. It's so fruitful most of the time.
Peter Bauman: You kind of convinced me to change my answer. I definitely agree that '80s talk was something that was really special, and something I think I will look back on and really appreciate, with some of the names you mentioned, Copper and Dan and David. I mean, it was really a privilege.
So we are, I think, do we have everybody's moments spoken of? Are we moving on to the next section? Okay. So we're going to start talking now, change gears a little bit and start talking about the current market and some of our theories and thoughts around it. So I'm going to hand it over to Mr. House.
Conrad House: Yeah, so I think this section will just have a broad discussion on the current market, how we see the micro generative art slash NFT scene. Maybe Peter can touch on the broader art market, and then maybe our operational man Zach Taylor over there can talk about the macroeconomic scene, since he's very dove into that. But I think we can start with just the micro industry and what thefunnyguys and I specifically see.
I think maybe the one thing that I really noticed over the past year is the expansion of minting infrastructures and platforms. There's been so many new platforms that have popped up, and some of them have really come out with some tooling that is really revolutionary. I think one that just comes to mind is Highlight. I've seen a lot of stuff that's come from Highlight that's been really impressive, and the tools that they provide to artists to create new ideas and explore new ideas is really fascinating. I think the things that we see with EmProps and this long-form procedural to AI pipeline infrastructure that are being created is really fascinating.
But then again, I also think that there could be some benefit to having a bit more cohesiveness. I think it's really tough. As some collectors really love certain artists, it's kind of hard to see exactly what they've created, since it's so sporadically spread out in the space across different chains, across different platforms. So I think something thefunnyguys and I have always wished to see, that we've never seen, is a one-stop shop to explore an artist's work across everything. I know this is a very technical obstacle that's hard to tackle, let alone having marketplace data that's also incorporated with a platform that would be able to show these broad overviews.
But I think all in all, it's a big benefit to have a larger space of ways to mint your work on primary markets, whether that's Manifold, your own contract, or using some front-end infrastructure that's already in place to make it easier for certain people to create work.
Maybe I'll throw to thefunnyguys real quick so you can expand on this a bit more and we can go back and forth.
thefunnyguys: Yeah, I think, being active in this space for a few years now, one big takeaway for me is that it's so clear that price and value are almost not correlated. In 2021, everything was so expensive. There was so much hype. But if we look back now at 2021, the space was so immature. It was basically one platform, Art Blocks, which only did maybe one release every week, a few upstarts, but there wasn't really much. And now we have fxhash, we have Highlight, and we have generative art on Solana, on Bitcoin. The space is much more mature now, yet somehow sentiment is a lot more negative. And it just makes me very hopeful that the future of the generative art space is very bright, because there's so much innovation that continues to happen.
And I think on the market side, the main reason why this is, is that all the attention has been going into the AI space, or lately into the meme coins. But that doesn't mean that the generative art space is not developing. And I think we're quietly preparing ourselves to see continued growth from now on.
And one thing that I have been paying a lot of attention to is just the blockchains that are scaling. I think Ethereum with its layer twos at the moment does 10 times more transactions than it does on the L1. Layer one Ethereum does 16 transactions per second. It cannot really go above that. But now with Base, with all the L2s together, we're doing 160 transactions per second, so a scaling factor of 10. And that will really be super interesting for generative art.
I think a glimpse into the future is a release that Zancan did with Highlight. I think they had 45,000 unique collectors for one generative art project, which resulted in more than 70,000 mints. And that makes me very excited. I think generative art is going to play a big role in the democratization of digital art and the global distribution.
Conrad House: Yeah, I think that kind of speaks to the idea that the art should be a little bit more accessible. Onboarding should be a little bit more accessible. It shouldn't be so hard to open up a wallet. It shouldn't be so hard to deal with gas fees. And I think we're moving in the right direction in that space.
And I do see that attention grab that everything's trying to have. Attention spans are so short with this digital age. Everyone wants the six-second dopamine rush and to move on to the next thing.
“I think generative art is going to play a big role in the democratization of digital art and the global distribution.” — thefunnyguys 29:32
But I do think a big thing over the past year is these quote-unquote diehard collectors of generative art and appreciators of generative art really showing their skin. I think we saw, obviously, a big market downturn from 2021. But it's interesting to see certain artists that perform really well over this downturn. One that specifically comes to mind all the time is Kim Asendorf. His market has only exponentially grown throughout this turbulent quote-unquote bear market that we've had. And others like Jan Robert Leegte. We see things like Mathcastles.
And I think this has to do with the people that have stuck around to the hardcore generative art scene having really determined a strong curatorial thesis about what they want to collect and why they want to collect it. And I see this appreciation really coming through just on the valuations of these artists.
There's a great collector called Quantized, and he created this thing called EFAN, or the European Fine Art NFT Index. And it's obviously kind of a meme. But I think if you ever look through that list, you get a grasp of some of these very hardcore digital artists that have garnered this collector base of these fans. They really appreciate the work. They really understand the work. They really understand the artist. And I think this goes a long way for creating a very fruitful and healthy market for these artists. And it's something that I find really interesting.
We do see a lot of things fall out of the market side and lose the broader attention span of collectors. But there are these very niche collectives and very niche artists that have only become more popular as the space has died out in a way. And I find that really interesting.
But maybe we can move it on to Peter, and he can maybe talk about the broader art market and come outside of our bubble of just this small digital NFT space that we immerse ourselves into.
Peter Bauman: Well, you guys brought up a lot of really good points. And if you're listening and have questions, please take note of them or write them down, because we'll start a Q&A in about 10 minutes. So please think of questions and ask us. I think what you two just covered right now, there are plenty of questions. And I definitely have some as well for you two.
But in terms of where I see the market, my ideas on the market: I do think it's fascinating to compare this market to the broader art market. And I think it's so interesting how many similarities there are in just the market structures, but also in their performance. So they both struggled quite mightily in 2023. The broader art market had layoffs at museums. Museums had low attendance numbers. The auction houses had poor revenue numbers and poor results, or lower than expected results, for their auctions pretty much across the board. It was pretty bleak for the mainstream art market. And it has been. 2023 wasn't really anomalous in that regard. The broader art market hasn't really caught up to pre-pandemic levels in terms of museum attendance.
And it's one of the reasons why you see institutions like MoMA looking into NFTs. They're interested in alternative revenue sources. They're also interested in the communities that those might bring to art. So I think it's a smart move. I think it is a very smart move across the board. I mean, you're seeing the mainstream art world in general merge more. You see Tina Rivers Ryan at Artforum, and the major exhibitions that we've had this year. I think there's a lot of exciting developments.
I also think it's interesting when you look at the broader art market, there's been a flight to safety in that market too. You see a lot of the names that you would expect, like the Monets and Picassos, that are fetching the highest price tags. And you see that in our market and this market as well.
I think with these kind of parallel struggles, in a way, it makes me feel better. It makes me feel like these issues that we're facing now are more structural than specific to our space.
I think it's also just short-termism, that we're looking at this space through a crypto narrative and through a cycle narrative. I think those are false crypto narratives. I think those are also discounting a lot of the previous growth that we've achieved in this space. The Basel art market report just came out, and it said that the space has grown 60 times since 2020. So yes, there's been some decline over the last year or so, but we've seen a 60x increase in four years. So I think a little bit of perspective and a little bit of patience is needed.
Four years ago, during the last quote-unquote cycle, where we were in the last cycle four years ago, there wasn't even an Art Blocks yet. We have no idea what kind of catalysts we're going to see emerge, again, if we are experiencing another cycle. We don't know what any sort of future major catalyst might be, like Art Blocks. The price of Bitcoin, largely because of COVID, was around $5,000 four years ago at this time. So again, we don't know how much, just on the smooth-brain level, numbers still go up.
I think it's instructive to look at maybe the punk floor price, because that's an asset that is somewhat comparable, that has performed across cycles. You always need a baseline to think about these sorts of things, like a base level. And I think the punk floor price is a smart one to consider. And if you look at that, I think it makes you feel pretty confident.
We're in kind of a bear market, again, not just in the NFT market but in a traditional art market as well. And I think that negative sentiment we're experiencing right now is basically what you'd expect in a bear market. And I think that's fine. And I think it's normal. And I do think it is transitory and it won't last forever, though, as well. I think there's reasons for optimism if number does go up soon. These markets are not very liquid. Just a little bit of number going up can mean quite a lot of movement. So I think there's a decent amount of reason for optimism.
I've spoken a lot, so I'll let you guys jump in.
thefunnyguys: I have something to add here, Peter. Thanks for your perspective. I think it was a really good shout that as humans we have the tendency to use these inflated moments like 2021 as our baseline. But that's a recipe for disaster. And if we zoom out, it's already a miracle that this digital art space emerged in such a brief period of time.
One thing I want to add from the Art Basel market report that caught my eye is that in the last year there's 7% more online sales in the art space. So the NFT space contracted. The overall traditional art space contracted. But there's a 7% increase in art sales that were facilitated online. And at this point in time, almost 20% of the total turnover in the traditional art space is actually facilitated through online channels. And of course, most of these transactions are traditional art purchases. People are still buying physical objects. But I do think this also sets the stage for consumer behavior that will be very adoptive towards digital art and NFTs. So yeah, I thought that was also a silver lining.
Conrad House: Yeah. And I also like the point that Peter brings up, that you can never really predict the catalyst in this market. One moment that I always think of, for maybe the people that are really familiar with Tezos, is when Hic et Nunc originally went down. There was a lot of sporadic thinking in the market and a lot of negative sentiment around it. And just shortly after, very shortly after, we saw fxhash come out. And this completely reversed the sentiment around the NFT market with Tezos. And we also saw these platforms like objkt and so many other amazing developers bring back Hic et Nunc and keep it alive.
So I think it's a really tough thing to know exactly what's going to happen the next, let alone one year or even five years or 10 years. The space is in its infancy stages, so I don't think any model can accurately predict anything to come. And I think as long as you stick with a really strong thesis, stay in your lane, collect what you like, enjoy what you enjoy, you kind of can't go wrong. Just don't stray from that thesis too much.
Maybe we can hand it over to Zach really quickly, and he can maybe talk about some macroeconomic things that he sees are relatable to the market that we're in, and maybe some points to bring up.
Zach Taylor: For sure. I'll keep it very, very brief, guys. I know you're not here to listen about macroeconomics. The one thing I would say: the Fed yesterday kept their interest rates at 5.25 to 5.5%, which is quite interesting, with inflation coming down from that COVID period around mid-2022. And then ever since, throughout 2023, inflation has come back to more of an acceptable level, currently roughly now around three or 4%, I believe, in the US. Many are forecasting Fed rate cuts throughout. The number has been guessed at around three rate cuts throughout 2024. So that's really huge. And bringing that back to, I suppose, our space, the trickle-down effects of a rate cut can most certainly not be turned a blind eye to. There most certainly will be trickle-down effects.
The other thing I just wanted to point out as well, which may put a bit of a bleaker tone on things, is the geopolitical risk in the world at the moment. You're all very aware how unstable things are geopolitically around the world. So in my mind, the world could look very different in a few years' time. And there's two different views that I see in my mind. Happy interest rate cuts, everybody's happy. But if people can't get along in the world, then war, God knows what could happen. Fingers crossed that does not happen.
But swiftly moving on, I'll shout Peter back in to take us away.
Peter Bauman: Yes, thank you, Zach. That was actually really interesting and very applicable. I mean, that stuff is really important to any market.
What we'll do now is open the floor up for questions. Actually, I see we have a request from our friend so-and-so. Let me hand you the mic.
Audience Member: Hi. Thank you guys for hosting this space. And thank you guys for doing everything you do for generative art. I think it's so important to provide some history and context, especially for the broader art market, which largely, I think, caught the narrative that this was somehow some flash in the pan. And I think what you guys are doing is invaluable to making that simply not the case, by providing proper context.
One thing that I wanted to ask you all is something that's come up a lot in a lot of the conversations that I've been seeing, related to chains, chain risks and the whole [...] for history, for preservation, etc.
Conrad House: Yeah, maybe I can jump in here. There kind of always is a lot of talk about collecting and which chain you're collecting on, and why you should collect on this chain and why you shouldn't collect on this chain. And I think, in the end of everything, it's really up to you as a collector. It's not going to matter what anybody else has to say to you. It's what you feel most comfortable doing.
But I think from a personal standpoint, we always come from the idea that we are very chain agnostic, and that it doesn't really matter what chain the art comes to, as long as the art itself is historically important or significantly important. We see it as a great add to the collection.
Obviously, there is certain art that is specific to the blockchain, maybe thinking about EVM art and stuff that uses contract-based things. Maybe those can only work in some languages like Solidity. Maybe they don't work as well in other languages. And maybe I think that is one point you can look at.
But I think one thing that a lot of people bring up is, like what you mentioned at the very end, there's preservation and worrying about the longevity of your piece. And I think that argument is a pretty weak one sometimes. I think most people here probably know that when you buy an NFT or a token, you're usually not really buying the art. You're buying a pointer URL that points to some decentralized storage system or centralized storage system, whether that's IPFS, Arweave, whatever kind of web server you want to host this art on. So if you really care about the art, and that's all you really care about, you have no financial incentive to worry about selling this art or whatever, you just want to view it. It doesn't matter if the chain goes down. As long as that IPFS link is always there and you have that IPFS link, you can always run that piece.
But there's always debate. Is IPFS going to last? Is Arweave going to last? And I think these debates are very tough. I think it's the same idea that you can't predict the NFT market, you can't predict catalysts. Everything is very infantile. Blockchains have only been around for a few years. IPFS, Arweave have only been around for a few years. So I think to say that one chain is going to last longer than any other chain is a bit redundant. I think it's very hard to predict that something will be here for 10 to 20 years down the line. I think there's more important digital preservation methods that you could take a step in, to make sure that your work can maybe last a little bit longer.
But obviously, I think if you are a bit more financialized and you care about being able to transfer the work and maybe even sell the work down the road, then that might be a topic that you do a bit more research into and you care about a bit more. And it's something that you would, I guess, incorporate into your collecting thesis. And I think I respect any collector that has a choice or a preference to either of these.
thefunnyguys: Yeah, I have some thoughts to add here as well. Thanks, so-and-so, for the good question. I honestly think we could devote an entire space to this because there's a lot to unpack here.
One thing that annoys me a little bit when people talk about chains is that they seem to imply that Ethereum will be around for the rest, like eternity basically, like the rest of human civilization. But Ethereum, last time I checked, was launched in 2015, less than 10 years ago. Who knows whether Ethereum will be around decades from now, let alone centuries from now. So that's always a bit annoying when people imply this.
Sure, Ethereum is the most decentralized out of the chains. I'm sure the probability of the art staying around, or the tokens staying around on Ethereum, is a bit higher. But I always look at art more as a social contract between collector and artist. There's a few artists in the crowd whose work we have collected. If something would happen to the token that points to the artwork in the near future, I'm pretty sure they would be willing to remint tokens somewhere else to make sure the social contract that is there would be respected.
And then one more thought I would like to add is that a lot of people talk about blockchains as technological phenomenons. And I think it's also because the collector crowd is so crypto-native. Most of them are technically literate. But I think it would be interesting to also look at blockchains from a cultural lens, as cultural phenomenons. And then people should realize that what happened on Tezos was a one in a million event. It was basically, I don't know how to say it, but lightning struck on Tezos. And this is not because of the technological benefits that Tezos had, but it was just because artists in 2021 were looking for a chain with lower carbon emissions. Tezos was there. A few artists started minting work there, like Marcel Schwittlick, who is in the crowd with us. He minted some of the earliest tokens on Tezos. And everything else was downstream from that.
And I think it's already art history, what happened there. And I'm pretty sure as a community, just as humans, we will preserve what happened there. And I'm highly confident that that will be the case. And I'm also confident that the tokens that are an indication of this cultural phenomenon will stand the test of time. So yeah, that's why Le Random collects a lot of art on Tezos and will continue to do so, simply because they're some of the most interesting objects we can add to our collection.
Peter Bauman: Yeah. And in terms of preserving that history, there's no question that we will continue to do that job, and that those Tezos and Hic et Nunc and anything Tezos related will be very prominently featured on the generative art timeline moving forward.
“But I think it would be interesting to also look at blockchains from a cultural lens, as cultural phenomenons. And then people should realize that what happened on Tezos was a one in a million event.” — thefunnyguys 49:23
Are there any more questions from the crowd?
Audience member: Hi. Yeah, sorry.
Peter Bauman: All right, go ahead.
Conrad House: Maybe just one small thing to add on preservation. I also think it's a bit redundant to think of blockchains as the quote-unquote weakest link in the chain. I think we talk about digital art. There's so many links to this chain that can get broken down the line that you would never predict. I mean, we talk all the time about Flash ActionScript and how many amazing pieces used to be created through Flash. And now many of those pieces can never be run again because there's no support for it on any browser. You have to get an emulator to run most of these pieces. And even when you get an emulator, sometimes these emulators can have floating numbers that completely change how the pieces look. Your browser can decide that it wants to round off a different floating number, and now your piece looks completely different when it renders in a browser. If you're using certain libraries within JavaScript, you have no idea if these libraries are going to be supported in five to 10 years.
There's so many things to think about when you think about preservation of your work. And I think the blockchain is arguably one of the last things you'd want to think about when you're really hardcore thinking about trying to preserve your digital artifacts. There's so many other things that can go wrong before the blockchain goes down, essentially, that I think people need to really take into consideration if they're really worried about their pieces lasting throughout the decades.
Peter Bauman: Well, and that's what Regina Harsanyi is constantly talking about, that there really is a job for preservationists, because it's not even just IPFS pinning, which is best practice. There's still, like you said, if the plugin simply goes down, that could be it.
Yeah, that is a really good point, so-and-so. And we have another speaker requested. And so, Freya, yeah, please.
Freya: Yeah, thanks. Thank you for hosting this space, and thank you for what Le Random has done for this industry. I remember you guys talking about Highlight, open editions, democratizing art. I agree that digital art is inherently suited to be owned by a larger audience. So can I ask, what do you think will be the cause of the next bull market of digital art? Will it be because more people are attracted to this industry, or because digital art has produced more spectacular works, or is that because of a better integration of digital art with on-chain or off-chain applications, such as utilities or tangible assets? Yeah, thanks.
Conrad House: That's a really good question, Freya. And I think in the end it's probably a culmination of all those factors that you mentioned. And I think it harkens back to the idea that you can never predict what catalyst is going to bring that quote-unquote next bull market. But yeah, I think all of those things you mentioned: better accessibility to collecting work on-chain and off-chain, making work very accessible, maybe even, I think, what we like to think of as maybe better contextualization, so people realize the importance of these works, can influence markets in a way. But it's a lot of factors. Maybe thefunnyguys can touch on this a bit more.
thefunnyguys: Yeah, it's a good question. It also depends how you define the concept of a bull market. I think it's always the large sales that capture a lot of the attention. These are the ones that go viral. But we are super excited about generative art as a way to onboard new people into art collecting, to democratize art, basically.
And I think there are already some catalysts in play there. I think I mentioned it before. Ethereum L2s are scaling. The ecosystem is developing. There's also interesting innovations happening on the wallet side, particularly what Coinbase is doing with their existing wallet products and also with the embedded wallets that they will roll out. I think that really can become a significant boost to the generative art space.
And I also think on the social network side, there's some decentralized social networks that are getting some more attention. For example, Farcaster. And there's some very interesting crypto-native behavior that's emerging there, because people can literally mint pieces within your social feeds, because every single user on Farcaster has a wallet attached, or an Ethereum address attached to their profile.
And I see all these different innovations, so L2s that are scaling, better wallets, decentralized social networks. I think all of these can come together in a very beautiful way to maybe onboard the next 100,000, or in the future maybe the next 1 million digital art appreciators. So yeah, that's my point of view. I think there's a lot happening behind the scenes that can come together.
Peter Bauman: Yeah, I think those are all really good points. And I just want to quickly add something related to what you said recently, so-and-so, on Twitter, about just looking at other people's collections. I think that's related to just, if you love art and you don't just love the money side, then you should be looking at other people's work. You should be looking at other collections. You should be engaging with the broader art market. You should have a subscription to the New York Times for their art section, or you should be reading about art regularly. These are things that I would encourage everybody to do, especially if you claim to love the art.
And I think these are ways that we can grow the space organically. If everybody's doing that kind of thing, if everybody's engaging with local art markets, then those are people that are already sort of interested in the space, that are maybe the first people that might actually join it, if we actually can, in some meaningful way, speak to them. So I really liked your tweet, so-and-so, and I would encourage people to do that.
Thank you everybody so much for listening today. Thank you for being a part of Le Random for the last one year. We can't believe it's been a year. And so thank you so much for being with us and joining us and being with us for one year later. And please give a read to Demystifying Generative Aesthetics, which just came out today at lerandom.art/editorial. So yeah, thank you everybody for listening, and we'll see you next time. Bye everybody.
Zach Taylor: Thanks everyone.
thefunnyguys: Thank you everybody. Have a great day.
Conrad House: Thanks everyone. Bye.
