The nine Punks are being sold as one lot.
May 10, 2021
Nine CryptoPunks being offered at Christie s 21st Century Evening sale on May 13, 2021. Courtesy of Christie s.
This week, CryptoPunks are the talk of the town.
Christie’s is auctioning off a single lot of NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, representing a collection of nine CryptoPunks at its 21st century evening sale on May 13 in New York. The auction house expects the lot to go for between $7 million and $9 million, either in actual dollars or cryptocurrency though, let’s be honest, most likely it will sell for cryptocurrency.
The simple pixel faces corresponding to these NFTs don’t look like high art by any stretch. Yet, here they are, selling alongside major works by Monet, Picasso, and Basquiat. Are Punks a new form of blue-chip art? Are they collectibles? Or are they simply a way to lure more money into cryptocurrencies?