Everydays – The First 5000 Days, by artist Beeple, made history on March 11 by becoming the first virtual Non-Fungible Token (NFT) artwork to to be sold by a major auction house, for a staggering $69.4 million, snowballing from a starting bid of $100. Christie's reported that 22 million people tuned in "for the final moments of the historic sale".
The sale also catapulted the South Carolina artist (real name is Mike Winkelmann), into the category of the "top three most valuable living artists", said Christie's. Beeple places third after Jeff Koons and David Hockney. The latter's Portrait of an Artist painting sold for a little more than $90m in 2018, while Koons's Rabbit sculpture went for $91m in 2019.
Unlike the traditional mediums of choice of his contemporaries, however, Beeple chose to render - and sell - his artwork in the digital format. The work is made up of 5,000 drawings created over the past 13 years.
Every day since May 2007, Beeple produced a drawing – at first with pen and paper before eventually moving to software – and these images make up the composite artwork.
In February, Christie’s announced the online-only sale of the work, claiming that it is the first time a purely digital artwork would be offered by a major auction house. Christie’s also said that it would accept payments via the cryptocurrency Ether, another first.
The artist sold the work as non-fungible tokens or NFTs, which are digital certificates that authenticate ownership through blockchain technology. NFTs can come in the form of drawings, music, video or other digital media, even tweets, memes, online articles or podcasts.
The NFT exists on the blockchain, where it cannot be copied or manipulated.
Since they are verified with a digital signature, NFTs offer the advantage of easier authentication important to the art world. NFTs also enable a digital work to be tagged, in a sense, as an original, which adds value to a medium that can be easily copied and duplicated.
Before the sale, Christie’s detailed what the buyer - who as yet remains unknown - can expect.
"The buyer receives the artwork file containing a digital signature from the artist and all vital details including time of creation, edition size and a record of any prior sales. These details are permanently attached to the artwork, providing an enduring guarantee of value.”
Prior to the Christie’s auction, Beeple wasn’t well-known in the art world, although he has produced concert animations and visuals for celebrity clients and maintains a large following online, with 1.8 million followers on Instagram and 200,000 on Twitter.
In December, a number of his artworks were sold at a different auction for up to $100,000 each. Overall, the artist made $3.5 million in a single weekend.
His artworks are oftentimes dark and absurd, with visuals that look as though they exist in a video game or dystopian sci-fi film. He transforms recognisable characters from pop culture and film, such as Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story, for example, and places them in fantastical worlds.
His subjects can be political, too, as in his NFT piece Crossroad, a digital video that features a naked Donald Trump lying face down on the grass as people walk past him. In February, the work was resold on the secondary market for $6.6m through the website Nifty Gateway.
Typically, when an artwork is resold by a buyer for quick profit – an act also known as “flipping” – the artist does not earn anything from the jump in price. NFTs may be able to change that. In Beeple’s case, his contract outlines that he receives 10 per cent of every sale on the secondary market.
In a statement released by Christie’s before the auction, the artist wrote: “I think this is a truly historic moment not just for digital art, but for the entire fine art world. The technology is now at a place with the blockchain to be able to prove ownership and have true scarcity with digital artwork so I think we are going to see an explosion of not only new artwork, but also new collectors and I am very honoured to be a part of this movement.”
Beeple is not the only individual using NFTs to sell their works. Musician Grimes sold her digital animations and artworks, WarNymph Collection Vol 1, on Nifty Gateway this month. It sold out within 20 minutes for about $6m. The band Kings of Leon are also releasing their new album as an NFT.
The result of the Everydays auction is a game changer for an art market that is eager to expand in the digital realm.
Barbie
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Tori Amos
Native Invader
Decca
New UK refugee system
- A new “core protection” for refugees moving from permanent to a more basic, temporary protection
- Shortened leave to remain - refugees will receive 30 months instead of five years
- A longer path to settlement with no indefinite settled status until a refugee has spent 20 years in Britain
- To encourage refugees to integrate the government will encourage them to out of the core protection route wherever possible.
- Under core protection there will be no automatic right to family reunion
- Refugees will have a reduced right to public funds
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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Yemen's Bahais and the charges they often face
The Baha'i faith was made known in Yemen in the 19th century, first introduced by an Iranian man named Ali Muhammad Al Shirazi, considered the Herald of the Baha'i faith in 1844.
The Baha'i faith has had a growing number of followers in recent years despite persecution in Yemen and Iran.
Today, some 2,000 Baha'is reside in Yemen, according to Insaf.
"The 24 defendants represented by the House of Justice, which has intelligence outfits from the uS and the UK working to carry out an espionage scheme in Yemen under the guise of religion.. aimed to impant and found the Bahai sect on Yemeni soil by bringing foreign Bahais from abroad and homing them in Yemen," the charge sheet said.
Baha'Ullah, the founder of the Bahai faith, was exiled by the Ottoman Empire in 1868 from Iran to what is now Israel. Now, the Bahai faith's highest governing body, known as the Universal House of Justice, is based in the Israeli city of Haifa, which the Bahais turn towards during prayer.
The Houthis cite this as collective "evidence" of Bahai "links" to Israel - which the Houthis consider their enemy.
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Western Clubs Champions League:
- Friday, Sep 8 - Abu Dhabi Harlequins v Bahrain
- Friday, Sep 15 – Kandy v Abu Dhabi Harlequins
- Friday, Sep 22 – Kandy v Bahrain
Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champioons League semi-final:
First leg: Liverpool 5 Roma 2
Second leg: Wednesday, May 2, Stadio Olimpico, Rome
TV: BeIN Sports, 10.45pm (UAE)
Nick's journey in numbers
Countries so far: 85
Flights: 149
Steps: 3.78 million
Calories: 220,000
Floors climbed: 2,000
Donations: GPB37,300
Prostate checks: 5
Blisters: 15
Bumps on the head: 2
Dog bites: 1
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Uefa Nations League: How it works
The Uefa Nations League, introduced last year, has reached its final stage, to be played over five days in northern Portugal. The format of its closing tournament is compact, spread over two semi-finals, with the first, Portugal versus Switzerland in Porto on Wednesday evening, and the second, England against the Netherlands, in Guimaraes, on Thursday.
The winners of each semi will then meet at Porto’s Dragao stadium on Sunday, with the losing semi-finalists contesting a third-place play-off in Guimaraes earlier that day.
Qualifying for the final stage was via League A of the inaugural Nations League, in which the top 12 European countries according to Uefa's co-efficient seeding system were divided into four groups, the teams playing each other twice between September and November. Portugal, who finished above Italy and Poland, successfully bid to host the finals.
Polarised public
31% in UK say BBC is biased to left-wing views
19% in UK say BBC is biased to right-wing views
19% in UK say BBC is not biased at all
Source: YouGov
Our Time Has Come
Alyssa Ayres, Oxford University Press
Company%20Profile
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2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups
Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.
Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.
Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.
Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, Leon.
Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.
Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.
Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.
Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.
White hydrogen: Naturally occurring hydrogen
Chromite: Hard, metallic mineral containing iron oxide and chromium oxide
Ultramafic rocks: Dark-coloured rocks rich in magnesium or iron with very low silica content
Ophiolite: A section of the earth’s crust, which is oceanic in nature that has since been uplifted and exposed on land
Olivine: A commonly occurring magnesium iron silicate mineral that derives its name for its olive-green yellow-green colour
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
