Anastasia Gorshkova, Andrey Tyurin, Polina Osipova and the ARTBLOGGERS team — an NFT STARS special
NFT STARS is preparing drops for three amazing artists represented by the ARTBLOGGERS agency. These young talented guys are all different in their work but they all have one thing in common — they turned to NFT to find a new audience! We asked them a few questions and talked to the ARTBLOGGERS team to understand how modern artists see their work.
Anastasia Gorshkova
How did you get into NFT and how do you see the future of this technology for yourself?
I wouldn’t say that I deliberately sought out NFT. I think it mostly happened because of the team I work with and how often I was asked why I haven’t tried out this new technology. I think for most digital artists, it is one of the most obvious directions to develop and everyone has heard something about NFTs; but it’s hard to understand and I really do want to. It’s probably quite simple for most people but I am just a little bit slow.
It is difficult to talk about the future since all my previous successes have been unplanned and spontaneous. So I will use my favorite tactic: “Don’t know what to do? Paint!”
Give three pieces of advice for beginner artists.
1. The first thing is to forget about success algorithms. The audience decides whether you are relevant and worthy of success. The only thing you can do is explore your artistry and find a compromise that allows you to be truthful to yourself and to your audience.
2. Don’t expect quick results. Your motivation should not depend on how many comments you get. It’s sad, but in the world of digital art, social media algorithms decide who sees your art. Therefore, I strongly recommend not measuring your talent by the size of your coverage.
3. Develop your own style. This is essential, nobody likes copy-cats. I have seen attempts to imitate my / someone else’s style and presentation and it looks bad; not because I have some kind of complex style, on the contrary, it comes easy to me, but because my style (like everything else), is the story of how I came to my own form of expression. If drawing is a “language”, then its style is a kind of “slang” — it must be understood for it to be used.
Does an artist have to be ‘starving poor’ or is this an outdated cliché?
I know many people who, for whatever reason, see artists as great martyrs and believe that only eternal need and suffering can inspire an artist to produce something really worthwhile.
I think romanticizing the poverty of great artists who have been dead a long time hasn’t led to anything good. They sold their works for very little money so as not to die of hunger, lived in tiny rooms and could not afford medical treatment when they got sick. I think they would have been mortified at the idea of their name or memory being evoked by some snob at a party a hundred years later as nothing more than a prop in an intellectual conversation to prove their academic superiority. These were real people, not just names in books.
Perhaps the phenomenon of the ‘hungry artist’ is good for those who want to buy art cheap and then sell it for huge sums later. The way I see it, this phenomenon is a grievous social injustice. Art is worth a lot and it’s time we remembered that!
Who knows how many more amazing paintings would be hanging on the walls of the world’s art galleries if artists were well-fed.
Andrey Tyurin
Do art and politics go together? And should they?
Art is an impulse, an idea, it is the voice of an artist. It can be premeditated or it can be impulsive. It certainly shouldn’t be constrained by notions of what’s “allowed” and what’s “prohibited”.
Perhaps in an ideal world where justice reigns, where no one’s property is ever stolen, where politicians don’t kill off their rivals, where common people are not imprisoned for having opposing views, there would be no need to combine art with politics. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
Artists often depict reality in their work, whatever it may be. And if in our reality now the agenda is neverending politics that affect everyone, even the most apolitical people, then for me, the answer is obvious: it is possible and sometimes even necessary to include politics in your work.
Do you think people in the future will really be more interested in having a file on a computer rather than a picture on a wall?
I don’t think it’s that univocal! You can have both because both digital and physical art have their advantages. Now there are many examples of NFTs with physical objects attached to them. Of course, sometimes there is a great need and desire to touch a piece of art you have acquired. But we all see how quickly virtual reality is developing. Already now, anyone can create their own digital museum where art collections can be viewed through VR glasses. Who knows, maybe in the near future people will have the opportunity to not only see and hear, but also touch and even smell inside a virtual reality, with no discernible difference to the physical world. Let’s not forget that NFTs are not just pictures on a computer, the technology allows you to record ownership rights for any asset on the blockchain.
Is advertising about expressing yourself or about making money?
For me, it is about both! Sometimes, a collaboration between a brand and an artist produces incredible results, allowing common people to get closer to art.
For example, an artist can design product packaging in their own unique style, thereby bringing art to even seemingly ordinary and everyday things. But of course, the artist should treat the choice of collaborators seriously because it is important that they are confident in the quality of the brand and that it truly inspires them to express themselves! And earnings should be much more than just a pleasant bonus because in my opinion, today’s artists should be well-fed and able to purchase any tools that help them develop their art.
Polina Osipova
Folklore motifs are visible in your artwork. Who or what are you inspired by?
I often turn to the past in my work. You’ll find nostalgic and personal elements (my childhood, my grandma’s house filled with knitted napkins, the village I grew up in, the journey home after school in -20°C freezing cold temperatures), along with national and large-scale cultural references, such as traditional crafts, archaeology and embroidery. Most of my inspiration comes from the intersection of this personal and grand past, as well as my imaginings of how it might exist in the present and the future. I am also inspired by “simple magic”, as I call it, or how the past exists in people’s personal behavior, namely the pagan habits of my family, the rituals they enact every day, not ever realizing their weirdness to strangers.
ARTBLOGGERS
Can advertising be art or does the commercial component present an impassable barrier for artists?
Of course! The agency was created for this very purpose. We are all tired of boring advertising campaigns. They have led to commercial fatigue, which means we have completely stopped responding to it.
I always liked to work as a coordinator. We know plenty of successful collaborations between artists and brands, from BMW art cars and Andy Warhol to Philip Pantone and Hennessy — none of which lean towards branding. Everywhere there is some artist’s style and the fresh new look of a brand’s DNA. This is what people come to us for.
A couple of decades ago, advertising became bold, brash and memorable. Commercials nowadays, like all other media content, are subject to restrictions that limit freedom of expression. Which approach do you like the most?
That’s why I like digital and NFT. I’m glad that the number of brands involved with this technology increases every year. New game mechanics appear, brands create their own tokens, even their own digital clothes. There is endless scope for experimenting and this field is like the Wild West at the moment. There are no rules, you can safely try to bridge the physical and virtual world without having to conform to anyone else’s limiting expectations.
What is advertising to you from a social point of view? What is its role?
It fuels trade and helps to form the tastes and habits of people. That’s why I chose to work with artists in this area. I want to create brilliant collaborations that are filled with meaning and concept.
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