The 279-year-old British-American auction house also set a record in 2023 for the highest price ever paid for digital art.
Sotheby’s, a fine arts auction house, sold “nearly $35 million” worth of digital art this year. The company’s vice president and head of digital art, Michael Bouhanna, provided the figures and referred to 2023 as “one of the most exciting years for digital art.”
Bouhanna concluded Sotheby’s year-end results pertaining to digital art on December 23 via his X (previous Twitter) account. Sotheby’s held its inaugural live digital art auction in 2023, drawing 300 guests and generating $12 million in revenue. In n
Selling the non-fungible token (NFT) under the name “Ringers #879,” created by digital artist Dmitri Cherniak, for $6.2 million also set a record for the highest price for digital art to date.
Including digital art only or incorporating it into sales of contemporary art, the house has held over 25 auctions in total. Additionally, the business has opened Sotheby’s Metaverse, an on-chain market for NFT secondary trading.
Sotheby’s will prioritise “supporting creators and enhancing their primary market strategies” in the upcoming year, as stated by Bouhanna Intelligence Network
The 279-year-old American-British clearing house first surfaced on the NFT scene in April 2021 when it held an auction of a digital artist going by the pseudonym Pak. Since then, Sotheby’s has sold digital art in a number of auctions that broke records.
In November, the total trade volume in the NFT space approached $1 billion, thanks to the recent surge in the price of Bitcoin. The average NFT transaction value increased by 114% in that month, from $126 to $270, indicating that users are more inclined to make higher-value trades than they were in prior Months.