Visuals

Steve Aoki hypes 5 of his favorite NFT art pieces

The superstar DJ has teamed up with Sotheby’s, choosing digital artwork for an upcoming sale. He gives Input insight into his selections.

portrait of Steve Aoki
Sotheby's

Steve Aoki thinks NFT art is ready for the spotlight.

A collector of everything from contemporary art to Pokémon cards, Aoki is curating an upcoming Sotheby’s sale featuring five NFTs by a variety of creators. (The auction also features more traditional art from the likes of Damien Hirst, KAWS, and Takashi Murakami.)

Barry Brecheisen/WireImage/Getty Images

“This is a kind of Renaissance period right now, where people are jumping in and finally dumping money into the marketplace, so that NFTs have a real cachet and institutional power.”

Steve Aoki

Barry Brecheisen/WireImage/Getty Images

The NFTs Aoki has chosen for the Sotheby’s sale are a reflection of the DJ and his interests. Some are nerdy, some are cyberpunk, and every piece of non-fungible art is backed by music, including one track contributed by Aoki himself.

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But describing them ourselves isn’t really going to cut it, so here are Aoki’s takes on each of the five NFTs...

Raf Grassetti

Krista Kim - Continuum

🎵: Jeff Schroeder

🔊Sound on 🔊

“I love that this piece is 20 minutes long, and it’s got this meditative, generated animation. You just kind of melt when you watch this piece. It’s really immersive and has got such a healing factor to it.”

Steve Aoki

Krista Kim

Ness Graphics - K1LLSCR33N

🔊Sound on 🔊

“I'm all about the future, so I had to have [one with] a cyberpunk kind of feel. It’s sci-fi — you’re playing this video game from the past, but it’s in the future, and you’re connected to the neural link. You just feel like you’re stepping directly into the game.”

Steve Aoki

Ness Graphics

KYT - In The Flesh

🎵: Philip Rugo🔊Sound on 🔊

Once I saw the anime heads, I knew this was gonna be part of the collection. I was already a fan of KYT as well. I just really love this soft feel of this piece and the anime faces are just changing and morphing and bringing new experiences. And the colors are absolutely incredible.”

Steve Aoki

Donald Iain Smith/Photodisc/Getty Images

Raf Grassetti - Fragments: Dreams of Color

🎵: GentleJammers🔊Sound on 🔊

“I love that Fragments: Dreams of Color is centered on the brain — I’m a big brain person. There’s this kind of beam coming out from the center and it’s moving with the music. The music is classical, so it makes you kind of gaze right back into it and stay in this hypnotic trance.”

Steve Aoki

📷: Raf Grassetti

Steve Aoki x pplpleasr - Serendipity

🔊Sound on 🔊

“I’ve worked with Godzilla in the past, so I knew I wanted to work on this particular piece — it’s called Serendipity for a reason. There’s this connection, this relationship, between two contrasting images, and I wanted [my] music to reflect that it’s kind of romantic. I didn’t stop until I really felt the tingles down my arms and was like, ‘Okay, I finally got there.’”

Steve Aoki

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