What can web3 bring to art communities?
Digitalisation programme launches with a conversation with muti collective, a web3 DAO and cultural association working with artists and musicians.
IN CONVERSATION WITH MUTI COLLECTIVE
Dear Friends,
We’re very excited to start our programme on Digitalisation with a conversation with Tabea and Nuno from muti collective, a DAO and cultural association in the Portuguese countryside. Rather than coming from the tech side, they’ve entered the web3 space as artists and cultural workers, looking for how new technologies can help communities like theirs. Maria met with the pair in Leiria to ask them all about it.
Official release date: 10 March. But as a subscriber, you can preview the full conversation here. Now to a snippet of their thoughts…
culturala
Could you tell me a little bit about your work with artists and musicians? How have you been using web3 and DAO as a tool to bring about the changes in the art you’d like to see?
muti
Sure! We work with artists from all disciplines, so we do a bunch of things: artistic residencies, events, exhibitions, artist stipends, collaborative projects as well as NFT creation. Blockchain technology and the DAO allow us to directly include the artists we are working with in the structure, and facilitates the whole financial admin aspect as everything is registered on the blockchain. It definitely gives a glimpse of what the future might bring – in many ways it’s faster and more direct than the traditional system.
culturala
So basically all your governing and money decisions are protected by the technology itself, nice! Which brings us to muti collective. How did you guys start that? Why did you choose to operate as a DAO?
muti
We started in spring 2021 when the NEAR protocol launched a creative hackathon that non-tech folks could submit their creative ideas for how to use blockchain technology. We had the idea for a decentralised governance model for a collective of artists, which uses a DAO structure and NFTs for rewards and membership. To submit this idea, we actually had to create the DAO before. This is how it all started. Note that none of us has an IT background, so it was a steep learning curve – but definitely worth while.
Muti collective uses the blockchain as a method of making collective decisions, organising their finances and working together to create art projects, support artists, and host music events.
culturala
Nice. And what are the benefits you see in using web3 technologies to create a governance system?
muti
Governance in web3 has several advantages: it is fairly easy to set up a DAO digitally (especially compared to setting up a physical institution), the members can be located globally while acting together, transfers are quicker and there’s no middleman for them. All the actions are also registered on-chain which makes admin and registration much easier. If you think about it, most of us use credit cards, bluetooth etc. without actually understanding the full scope of the technology. It’s the same with a blockchain – it’s just a new way of seeing and building structures.
culturala
What advice would you give young artists breaking into the digital art world? How can we use these technologies in a responsible and sustainable way – and do you think we can? We speak about this in-depth in our video conversation, but it’d be great to get a short answer, too.
muti
Our advice would be to not follow every hype (there is a lot of that around!), to stay true to yourself and to reach out to communities or other artists because that’s how we can change things and make things happen. Be cautious about scams and ask a lot of questions.
It is also important to remember that not every NFT creates a millionaire. But the fact that NFTs work with forever royalties and DAOs allow a collective governance makes this new approach so important for artists. Do try to understand the meta-level of what the blockchain actually means and how impactful those new possibilities can be.
In terms of sustainability you have several options. Some projects even work directly to support the land, artists can have a look at ReFio projects and generally use proof-of-stake chains because those are more environmetally friendly. But given the fact that we all use Google, cellphones and other technical tools, we should all have a look at our general ecological footprint and not only start thinking about that when we hear the word blockchain.
culturala
And last but not least, what do you hope that web3 will bring to the arts in general?
muti
A different consciousness towards the value of artists and their art, more global connections and a bigger stage for emerging artists. We are also looking for new experiments on how the digital tools can be implemented in a tangible way. But we’re still at the very beginning of this new area, so it will be interesting to see how humans and technology work together – hopefully for the better.
With love,
culturala and muti
Tabea and Nuno are the founders of muti collective. Tabea is a cultural producer, web3 educator and event organiser. Nuno is a musician, cultural producer and artistic director of muti. They’re based in the Portuguese countryside 40 minutes drive north of Leiria where they live with their two dogs.
You can find out more about muti via their telegram channel mutiDAO, instagram @muti.collective and website muticollective.org where you can also get involved with their open calls and events.
Take the best care of yourselves and each other.
Sent with love from culturala