What is Rare Digital Art? originally appeared on Quora, the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better understand the world. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus.

Before talking about Rare Digital Art, I’d like to start by talking about Digital Art.

Digital Art is artwork where the artist primarily uses digital technologies and techniques to create it. Examples include: GIFs, Generative Art, Videos, and more. The problem facing digital art today, and one of the primary reasons why sales of digital art haven’t seen the same level of growth, is its lack of uniqueness and authenticity. People don’t want to pay for a digital artwork that can be easily downloaded and claimed by thousands of others. It’s also hard to prove the authenticity of digital artwork, particularly once it’s been shared and distributed across the internet.

However, there are millions of digital artists creating art in this form today, most of whom make their money by either selling services (e.g. contract and commissioned work) or selling physical copies of their digital works (e.g. t-shirts and framed prints), which of course is limiting. Have you tried printing a GIF onto a t-shirt?

Rare Digital Art is a new form of digital art, where the authenticity and uniqueness of the artwork is guaranteed by blockchain technology, the same technology behind cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ether.

Rare Digital Art is cryptocurrency with a pretty face. — Joe Chiappetta[1]

Here’s how it looks.

In the example above, the digital artist takes their digital artwork, their identity information, and inextricably links it to a unique token on the blockchain. A blockchain is a public database with the unique property that once something is set in it; you can’t change it. The token is the tangible unit on the blockchain that represents the authentic artwork.

Digital artwork in this form has several key benefits:

1. Authenticity. The authenticity of the artwork is now publicly available and verifiable on the blockchain that it resides on. Because this information can’t be changed, the creator or future collector can be assured that the authenticity can always be proven.

2. Truly limited editions. The creator now has the ability to issue only a finite number of signed and authentic copies of their digital artwork, differentiating those from a copy that someone might obtain through other means. (e.g. screenshotting or right-clicking and saving it)

3. Ownership. Since the digital artwork is linked to a unique token, a collector can now take ownership over it and store it in a digital wallet. If the token follows industry standards (e.g. ERC-721) then the token is immediately accessible and sellable on dozens of marketplaces and platforms.

4. Liquidity. With ownership also comes liquidity and the ability to freely sell, trade or send the artwork to anyone, without any restrictions set by an external entity. The same way in which Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies can be sold and traded. A healthy and open secondary market is vital in increasing the value of an artwork.

5. Provenance. The history of ownership of the artwork is fully tracked on the blockchain. A creation’s ownership history will impact its current and future value, which is now always available for the world to see.

Going back to the original problem, why would someone pay to own even a rare digital artwork when anyone can still copy the underlying digital file?

For people who only care about using/viewing a digital creation, rare digital artwork won’t matter too much to them. However, for people who care to own and collect art, it’s a huge difference maker. To a collector, authentic artworks are significantly more valuable than a replica. A perfectly framed photograph of the Mona Lisa, or even an A.I generated replica down to the brush strokes, would still be valued significantly less than the original piece created by Leonardo da Vinci. Rare digital art is bringing this same capability, to discern authenticity and uniqueness, to digital artwork — which matters to collectors.

Footnotes

[1] Rare Digital Art Ownership Visualization

This question originally appeared on Quora. More questions on Quora:

* Blockchain Technology: How would you explain blockchain to a non-technical audience?

* Human Behavior: What is the psychology behind ownership and collecting?

* Digital Products: What are some good advice for digital creators who want to monetize their works?

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