South African Company Helps Create Local Art for Virtual World

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South African Company Helps Create Local Art for Virtual World

When South African artist Fhatuwani Mukheli paints at his workshop in Johannesburg, he creates two works at once. There is the traditional piece, an image on cloth, but also another that exists in the virtual world as digital art.

Mukheli uses The Tree, an online market for South African artists to share and sell their art as non-fungible tokens, or NFTs.

An NFT is based on a technology called blockchain, which is also used with digital money known as cryptocurrencies.

An NFT can be attached to a piece of digital artwork or other things existing in digital form. The NFT can be used to provide proof that the pieces are real. While anyone can view the work, the buyer has official ownership rights over the pieces.

Mukheli said, "There's a virtual world where people are buying land in it." He was talking about the metaverse. The metaverse is a non-physical world in which individuals interact through different kinds of digital technology. Technology companies like Microsoft and Facebook say it is the future of the internet.

"People have properties there," Mukheli said, adding "and your art can be on those walls."

Buyers of Mukheli's art receive both the physical art he makes in his workshop and the digital NFT. Other artists on The Tree sell up to five limited edition NFTs for each piece, or digital prints. Mukheli has already made thousands of dollars by using the service.

Trevor Stuurman is one of the artists on the Tree. He said, "I think it's important as an artist and a creative to always play where the ball is going and not necessarily where it's at."

Critics say blockchains, digital places used to store information, are not climate-friendly because they use a great amount of computing¹ power.

The Tree says it saves energy by running on Polygon², a blockchain that uses much less power, and offsets³ each sale by sending money to Greenpop. Greenpop is an environmental organization that plants trees across much of Africa.

Dan Portal is one of the founders⁴ of The Tree. He said, "It's not just about art and artists and the story, it's about making sure that this growth in technology for artists doesn't come at a cost to the planet."

Words in This Story

virtual – adj. existing or occurring on computers or on the Internet

digital – adj. using or characterized by computer technology

1 computing   

n.计算

参考例句：

• to work in computing 从事信息处理
• Back in the dark ages of computing, in about 1980, they started a software company. 早在计算机尚未普及的时代（约1980年），他们就创办了软件公司。

2 polygon   

n.多边形；多角形

参考例句：

• A polygon with ten sides is a decagon.十条边的形状叫十边形。
• He conceived the first proof that the 17-sided polygon is constructible.他构思了17边形可以作图的第一个证明。

3 offsets   

n.开端( offset的名词复数 )；出发v.抵消( offset的第三人称单数 )；补偿；（为了比较的目的而）把…并列（或并置）；为（管道等）装支管

参考例句：

• The following paragraphs deal with intra-source offsets and the so-called \"bubble\" concept. 下面讨论污染源内部的补偿和所谓的“泡泡”概念。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法
• The preceding paragraphs were concerned with inter-source offsets. 前文牵涉到污染源之间的补偿。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

4 founders   

n.创始人( founder的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• He was one of the founders of the university's medical faculty. 他是该大学医学院的创建人之一。 来自辞典例句
• The founders of our religion made this a cornerstone of morality. 我们宗教的创始人把这看作是道德的基石。 来自辞典例句