Art Blocks's Marfa weekend shows off its creativity

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Art Blocks's Marfa weekend shows off its creativity

While the NFT market is still very dismal, some arts-focused projects utilizing blockchain technology have managed to stay consistent-or even, in a few cases, grow-over the last year and a half. Art Blocks, a digital art platform and gallery that utilizes NFTs to mint and distribute generative art works to collectors around the world, is one of those few outliers.

After launching its own NFT marketplace in March, a move intended to protect the increasingly threatening practice of enforcing creator royalties, a fee between 2.5% and 10% sent back to an NFT creator in secondary market sales-Art Blocks has broadened its scope of curated, generative digital art projects to encompass live, globally-spanning in-person minting events and digital art projects featuring physical components.

Art Blocks held its third annual in-person gathering, the Marfa Weekend, held in Marfa, Texas, the collective's sole physical gallery. Hundreds of Art Blocks collectors, artists, and community members flocked to the small desert town to spend a weekend discussing the future of generative art, showcasing cutting-edge projects, and celebrating the organization's remarkable resilience.

The founder and CEO of Art Blocks, Erick Calderon, met with Sander Lutz, lead culture reporter at Decrypt's SCENE, to explore the company's work and Calderon's perspective on its recent accomplishments.