The digital artist made a pile of money on NFTs before the crypto market crashed.
Now he has his eyes on the art world.
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Ambient music pipes through the speakers as the boss,Mike Winkelmann, a.k.a.
Beeple, sits in his office with his back to six cable-news channels playing on mute.
Its one of my favorites, the artist says, patting the plumbers bare chest.
This is the Space, the mad laboratory of the worlds richest digital artist.
But Winkelmann has no regrets.
I was never an NFT evangelist, he tells me.
What I am is an evangelist for digital art.
The selling aspect is a means to an end.
I would love not to sell because that is the least fun part, even though its necessary.
But I am not some crypto bro, because there is actually substance to what I have been doing.
Nevertheless, its perfect casting.
Buyers could respect that kind of perseverance and diligence.
But he also warned that most tokens were risky bets that could easily fall to zero.
Carolyn reached out shortly after the auction.
She thought I was an algorithm, Winkelmann says with a laugh.
Immediately, we clicked.
The daily sketches, which are known asEverydays,have their appeal.
Not everyone is convinced of their merit.
Writing in the New YorkTimes,Jason Farago declared the battle of good taste over.
When I read this quote to Winkelmann, he simply throws up his hands and laughs.
Winkelmann chooses his subjects like a tabloid editor.
I have always been a big news junkie, he says.
During my visit, Boris Johnson announces he is stepping down as the U.K. prime minister.
It is classic Beeple, both bracing and a little on the nose.
Winkelmann recently made his first physical work,Human One,a video sculpture.
He has bigger projects planned.
The enormous hangar in his studio complex is to become a stage for immersive art installations.
I would love the room to feel like youre stepping into a video game, he says.
What would the room look like if it was hell?
If you were to walk in and there were piles of bodies on the screens?
Then you could immediately flip a switch and make it feel like Heaven.
Charleston is the incubation site for these projects.
I am focused on legacy now, he says.
Its about the real shit that people will give a fuck about 200 years from now.
Who cares about a stupid auction anymore?
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