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Art Chat w/ @booscrew Ep. 119 ft @jakejfried
Recorded: April 16, 2025 Duration: 2:01:01Space Recording
Short Summary
In a recent discussion, artist Jake Fried shared insights on the evolving landscape of digital art, emphasizing the importance of partnerships with traditional institutions like the Orlando Museum of Art, the launch of innovative projects like his fully verifiable photo project on-chain, and the growing acceptance of NFTs in museums. He highlighted trends in the NFT space, including the rise of community-driven projects and the significance of grants in supporting artists, showcasing a vibrant future for digital art.
Full Transcription
Thank you. How's it going, Jake?
Yo, what's up? Can you hear me?
I can. Can you hear me?
Yeah.
Amazing. We're doing it.
I just sent out a little post,
and I'm going to send it to a couple group chats as well.
Really quick.
Sounds good. I just connected new headphones so i still sound
okay you sound you sound great yeah if there's any problems i'll make sure to let you know
where uh where are you at right now i'm in boston uh okay studio at home
Okay.
Studio at home.
Cool.
I didn't,
I forgot that's where you,
I forgot that's where you were out of.
I knew it was somewhere up north,
but I couldn't remember exactly.
And I have like,
I don't want to say I've made a promise to myself,
but I generally try and research as little as possible beforehand with guests outside of like what I know about them from their art so that I can approach it as organically as possible.
So I didn't do a refresher.
I just went off of loving your art and just wanting to have a chat.
So here we are.
That's great.
And then I won't bore you as much.
Yeah, I'm in Boston.
Where are you?
Are you in Chicago?
I'm in Florida. I live in Orlando. I'm actually.
And that was part of like my connecting point to your work, which I wanted to get into in a little bit.
So I'll save that. And then in a minute or so, we'll give a proper introduction after a few more people tune in and just jump right into things.
Cool. I'm actually heading down to Florida tomorrow. Oh, wow. Where?
My folks live in Delray. Okay. And yeah, taking the kids and life.
That's pretty cool. It should be great. Yeah. The weather is nice right now. Like I know it's
like the most cliche thing ever, but like it not too, too hot, and it's not
cold.
I think it'll be good. If you come
in a couple months or even a couple weeks, you might totally
cook. Oh, yeah. This is
the latest in the year that I'm
willing to head down there.
I'm excited because it actually really hasn't
warmed up too much yet up here.
It's not
still snowing or anywhere near that is
it right uh i mean it snowed like two or three days ago jesus but it was in the 60s the last
couple days today it's a little colder again but um that's insane i'm like it's you know i've been
up here for a long time and uh you get used to the winters. But this winter was actually pretty long and tough,
maybe the worst in over five years, I think.
Wow.
I'm ready for it to be over, for sure.
Yeah, I can't even imagine.
We are not on the same planet.
The same thing every year, dude.
I'm like, I'm just not going to let it get to me.
I get through January, February, March,
and then like April. I just expect it to be nice April 1st. And when it's not, I'm like, I cannot
take this one more day. Yeah, no, 100%. I would feel exactly the same. But we keep pressing on.
And on that note, I think it's a, I don't know, I think it's a good segue to just jump into things.
My co-host Kips has multiple β do you know Kips?
Yeah.
I mean, one of the reasons I wanted to do this, I hope he shows up.
But we've been connected for years now in this space.
Oh, cool.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He can be very sporadic or hit or miss. So he might,
he might show up like 15 minutes late. He might, he might show up in two minutes, who knows? Um,
but so either way it'll be great, but yeah, so this is, uh, a weekly conversation that
I have with a different artist where we sit down and get to know their work. I think it's actually technically 100 episode 120, but who knows? Who's counting anyways?
And it's just been a blast to sit down with different artists every week and get to know
their stories. I'm a portrait photographer. I've been in the space for the last, I don't know,
four or five years now. I recently released what we're
claiming to be as the first ever fully verifiable photo project on chain. And that's been cool.
And yeah, just been enjoying it. So it's been a lot of fun.
Cool. Yeah, I was checking out some of your work. I listened to a little bit of an episode
you did before where you were talking about that project. And yeah, I'd love to see you
experimenting with it. And maybe we'll get into it. But there's so many different ways that artists
can kind of explore the blockchain and how they put their work up there. And I think you and I
definitely have different approaches, but it's cool to see what you've been doing.
Thanks. I appreciate that. It's been a lot of fun.
And I was going to say, like, I've done so many millions of things, like, over the last, like, four or five years, I feel like, in the realm of, like, the NFT space.
But I originally did a project called Punk Portraits, um, and it was in 2021.
It was a photo project.
It really, like, took off, and then it completely died, like most everything else, it seems,
during that time period.
Um, but the thing, the reason I mention that, oh, Kips is here.
Incredible.
Um, we'll pause that and say hi to him, and then I'll jump into it.
Kips, welcome.
Hey, fellas.
This might be the first time a guest was ever like, I'm here because of Kips.
Oh, really?
Are you lying right now?
Don't lie.
He said it.
He said it with his own two lips.
That's the stuff.
That's the good stuff.
Happy Wednesday, guys.
What's going on?
Jake said it snowed three days ago there.
Can you believe that?
It's snowing here right now.
That's fucking crazy.
I literally am going to go walk outside in a t-shirt and some shorts in a couple hours after this.
That's unnecessary.
Let's not start this space like that. It's 80 degrees That's unnecessary. Let's not start this space like that.
It's 80 degrees, Kip.
Let's not start this space like this.
This is...
All right.
Well, what I was saying, and then we'll jump into things, was...
Well, first, welcome.
But I was telling Jake that in 2021, I started a project with a friend called Punk Portraits. And I felt like I poured my life and soul and
existence into it. And it just kind of died, even though it was really successful at first.
And I had just been like parading everywhere, like I could, shouting from every rooftop about
like blockchain and NFTs. And then I got invited to go to an opening at the Orlando Museum of Art by
my friend Coralie, who's the curator there. And they were doing a whole entire installation on
NFTs and digital art. And one of the biggest center points of that whole installation was a massive projection from
Jake and I remember like literally walking into this and feeling like all of the work that I had
like been doing for the last couple years even if it like didn't get like notoriety per se like
it felt like it actually had meaning because someone who was like doing something on the
blockchain was like having their work shown on a massive scale in the middle of like a big museum and yeah i don't know
that was just a really pivotal moment for me to like just keep going and working at digital art
and like realize like hey like this has value like there are people that find work specifically on the
blockchain important so that was like a huge reason for me wanting to have this interview today.
And I just thought it was really cool and wanted to say thanks.
Yeah. Oh man, that's great. And I'm so glad you got to see that.
When was that? Like 2022 or 23?
I think it was 23.
Yeah.
Cause it had been a while since things had like settled down from like the 2021 bull run.
I was honestly surprised that the museum did that because multiple levels, they had like had the FBI like raid them for fraud and fake art like a year before that.
And then on top of that, NFTs were just kind of in a down cycle.
So I honestly did not expect that move but it was great like the whole entire installation was so fucking cool like
grant yun had had a piece there um there were a few other like really big artists as well but like
yours was like one of the biggest on display there and i just remember just being so blown away one
by the art but then again
just like the fact that you were using like blockchain technology and it was in the museum
so really cool yeah i mean that's great and whenever someone is like the space is dying
or what's happening here it's always like there are real museum shows pretty regularly now
featuring nft technology and explaining it and i do remember from the Orlando show, like in the, you know,
the pamphlet that comes with the show,
it explains like what an NFT is to audiences that have no idea and talks.
It even has like the contract address for the pieces that I had up there.
And I just, I know we're going to have more and more of that over time.
What was also cool is I think that show was called like 20 somethings.
They were very clearly trying to attract young audiences, over time what was also cool is i think that show was called the 20 somethings they were yes very
clearly trying to attract young audiences which every museum is that desperate to do these days
and um it was highlighting like collections of young collectors yeah it was one collector
specifically um uh he was this kid that was like in his mid-20s in Orlando. I don't know how Coralie found him, but he like has collected so much art like over the last like five or 10 years.
So I think like 90% of it was all like his collection specifically.
Yeah, he did own the edition that was on view there.
And then we loaned the one of one that I had there from another collector.
But yeah, I met with him a few times.
And yeah, I just think it's a sign that like,
obviously young collectors are going to be the future major collectors.
And that a lot of what needs to be done here is just time and, you know,
age and maturity of the space and participants.
But yeah, that was great.
And I hope to have more work in museums over the space and participants. But yeah, that was great. And I hope to have more
work in museums over the next few years. It's always, in my opinion, kind of like the best way
to really view my art. You know, it's very clean and quiet and you can focus on the work and it's
really highlighted professionally. But I've had my work screened in all different types of places.
But yeah, museum exhibitions are like the top and definitely something I aspire to do more of and have more of
yeah I feel the same like Coralie actually like gave me like literally my first opportunity ever
to have like an installation in a museum and like I share the exact sentiment where I'm just like that is like literally my favorite, favorite like top tier thing.
And on that note, I do want to just backtrack a second and have you give a proper introduction of yourself and your work.
The first question that I like to ask every guest is who are you and what do you do?
And I'll let you take it away, Jake.
Yeah, I could go on for so long
so I'm going to try to keep this concise.
I'm an artist.
I'm a professor.
Like we were talking about before,
I live in Boston.
I'm a father.
And I'm mainly known for doing
hand-drawn experimental animations.
Specifically reworking the same drawing or painting over and over again, kind
of scanning it or photographing it as I go. So spending months up to a year on kind of
one physical work of art that I keep changing and recording. And I made a career out of
that. I used to be a museum educator, then I became a professor of experimental animation.
I've done a lot of commissions for Adult Swim and Netflix.
I just did a Coldplay video in January.
But most of my career has been making, you know, works of art just for myself,
putting them online for free, and then sort of developing my whole career from there. So winning awards, grants, licensing and commissioning my work.
Just had some big, like I did a Gojira corn tour last year where they licensed some of my pieces.
So mostly just making this work, having it do really well online, getting kind of critical success. Like I said, kind of museum and gallery shows about mostly hand-drawn or kind of experimental animation, things like that.
And when this space kind of got on my radar in 2020, early 2021, it was like, this is kind of exactly what I've been waiting for.
It's been hard to, I mean, most digital artists know this.
I think it may be even harder for kind of moving image artists like myself.
Even though what I'm doing to me is like the same as making sculptures or paintings,
it's just a lot more difficult to put them in a gallery, sell them as one of one art objects
and develop a career as like a professional artist in that way.
So I've been, I've been, I was a full-time teacher. And like I was saying, doing a lot
of commissions and licensing. But the minute that there was like an official version of my work
that could be, you know, minted on the blockchain with provenance and scarcity, it was sort of,
it's a game changer. And I've been, I knew something like this was going to always happen in one way or another.
I think all art, not just digital art,
needs this sort of, you know, trustless ledger system.
I worked in museums for a long time
and it's all so shady and opaque, right?
And everyone knows just buying from galleries
can be a really unclear,
kind of like doesn't feel like a free system
for everyone to participate um so i was like i'll just hold on to this work i'm making license it
um and because i'm teaching i can support myself and just make the work i want to make rather than
um just commercial work and knowing that i was getting so much love online all the time it was
like all right this is worthwhile this is what I want to do with my life.
Make the best work I can, period.
And then, you know, when this came out, so I mentioned my first work in 2021.
It was kind of just, it's perfect, right?
So I had a lot of early success and have continued, even though things have been up and down,
obviously, in this culture, in the space, I've maintained a pretty healthy practice and career here, and I feel really strongly
about where things stand for me.
And thankfully now I'm in a place where I still get to just make the art I want to make,
put it online for free, but actually make a living from it and develop my, you know,
in quotations, my brand and keep my, you know, I want my work to maintain and grow in value, you know, not
just economic reasons, but more like historical reasons and influential reasons.
So, yeah, and I'm a teacher, so I love participating in the space in other ways beyond just my
own work, but I'm a collector and I really like supporting other artists and just being
part of the community and hanging out.
Again, it's a lot of people are down on the space. I know.
And like you're saying that things have been tough,
but I'm still a bunch of people from around the world,
just logging on, hanging out, sharing their art, talking about it.
It's pretty damn cool. And I think revolutionary
and very exciting.
And I think a lot of people who might be a little down right now,
we're going to actually look back on 20, 23, 24, 25. It's like some of the most exciting moments of their life,
like foundational kind of, we're building something. That's also what I love. I'm an
experimental animal. I love experimental anything, pushing the boundaries, trying new things out,
being different. And this just feels like a really fresh, different environment where
things are wide open. There's no rules. It's, you know, people say the Wild West in a bad
way, but it kind of the Wild West in a good way, in a cool way, right? It's like we get
to like claim this land and build on it. And there's, it's exciting to be a participate
in it. So I'm here every day because I'm just excited by it. And I have now like a really dedicated, enthusiastic audience.
So yeah, hopefully I kept that short enough, but explained enough.
No, you answered it eloquently.
It was great.
It all made sense.
Yeah, it's funny.
I have a couple of things that I want to ask you from there. But I can 100% just relate with, like, the freedom that has come from this space.
Like, it may not always be, like, financially or through sales.
But from a creativity and, like, exploration and, like, curiosity standpoint, like, you were talking about how, like, you've been able to just try all these different things.
And it's funny like I resonate with that so much because like we talked about earlier like right
now I'm in the middle of a thousand piece collection that's all like just goofy and
mundane cell phone photos and like I never thought in my life like after being like a like decade
plus like career artist that like I would be making like art on my cell phone and like releasing it to people digitally.
And like from that, like having people actually enjoy it.
And like, I'm like doing a show in a couple of weeks with like all these cell phone images.
And it's just like, you never know like what this, like what this space is going to open
you up to.
And like, even though like there are these downs or like you have like these falls in the market or whatever, like the creativity, like you were saying, is endless.
And I guess that kind of brings me to the segue of wanting to ask you, like you have all these different things, but like what excites you the most right now with what you're working on or participating in or even exploring?
participating in or even exploring? Yeah, sure. So I'm always kind of bouncing around again as an
Yeah, sure.
experimental animator. I think it's my job and as an artist to just like not close doors. Keep an
open mind. Never get stuck in like a pattern. You never want to repeat yourself. I'm very like
hyper aware that I'm not taking a shortcut or just sort of like doing something that I know would work because it worked before.
My whole my work is a discovery process. I do not like storyboard or plan things.
So I think of everything I make is sort of an experiment, an artistic experiment, find out what happens.
And a lot of times, you know, it isn't the best thing I ever made or I feel like I hit dead ends.
you know, it isn't the best thing I ever made, or I feel like I hit dead ends. But generally,
if I just kind of push it, things look hard enough, like, I figure out where I'm supposed
to be going, and I keep following that path. So the major change in my life in the past couple
years is I had my second kid. And I know from when I had my first child that that definitely
changes my lifestyle and my, the way I think about my art um again my work is very
personal and self-reflective and there's like almost nothing more life-changing than having a
child um beyond just a schedule but just sort of like philosophically and spiritually um so
kind of knowing you know a kid is coming i in I kind of was like, that's when I finished a bunch of
different projects. Um, I finished open eyes, which was my last, like, I think you posted a
clip of it. The deeper understanding post is part of that. My last like one minute, like year long
piece. Um, it's just, we can get into it more, but it's like insane levels of work goes into
these pieces. Um, and so in 2023, getting ready for the baby,
that's when I finished up my second print
with Avanart as well, which was based on OpenEyes, that piece.
And I did the Northstar project,
which is one of these bigger kind of blockchain experiments
where it's on the doppelganger contract.
And it's one edition where the collectors can change,
you know, through ether scan or through signing the contract can change what is the art that's
displayed on the edition and really liking to play. I really like to remix my work. A lot of
people who follow me on the timeline know that. It was the first opportunity where it's like,
I can remix this one piece over and over in different ways and have it all be one NFT.
So exploring that for most of that year. And then, yeah,
my kid was born and it was, you know, stay at home, dad,
not a lot of time to work, not a lot of sleep. So I was like,
this is going to be a great time to just sort of loosen up,
experiment with faster methods and play.
And I've always done flip books on the side and as quick experiments.
And when I teach animation especially to like intro classes or to younger students flip books are like great tools
to you know it's it's pre-digital animation pre-cinema and so I just focused on making flip
books for like you know eight months last year And that all came together into the piece Outer Reaches that I released with Noble Gallery, which also came with the print, a silkscreen print.
And, you know, I really love that piece.
And it's such a for me, like a time capsule of last year.
um so fast forward to where i am now um doing more experiments with kind of like bold fast imagery but
So fast forward to where I am now.
finally my daughter has more reliable daycare she's older you know almost 18 months old
um so i really feel myself getting back into a groove of being able to focus a lot deeper
on the work so i have been working on one of these like really intense super complicated
pieces that feels like it'll never end it's like putting all of myself into it um and yeah i'm in it now and you never want
to like jinx yourself because who knows what will happen but um i'm a solid like eight or nine
seconds into it like this is like two months of work and uh it feels very it's very true to myself
it's actually i'm trying to be as as explicitly kind of personal as I can.
I posted some still frames in the past few months, but like, it, it's like features like, you know, realistic depictions of my home and self portraits and my neighborhood.
And so that's what I'm playing with now, just sort of like now that I have the time.
After a year or so of like a break from working that hyper detailed and long form to get back into it.
And I assume I'm going to be working on this piece probably the rest of the year.
And I feel a lot of comfort and safety in that where I'm at artistically in my journey, where it's like I got a lot of time to experiment, get stuff out of my system.
Matt artistically in my journey where it's like,
I got a lot of time to experiment, get stuff out of my system,
explore,
not feel like stuck that I have to make some massive masterpiece right now.
And that's sort of the natural ebb and flows.
I think of creativity. It's like, we're now, I'm like,
I feel ready to jump back in and really get into it. And I'll do,
to be honest, like having now been in it for like a couple of months,
it is my favorite place to be.
I have something to think about all the time.
You know, I wake up, I'm like really deep into this piece now.
I've been spending so much time with it.
It's like every day you wake up, you have something really big to build on.
I feel a lot of sense of like accomplishment because it's like, look what I already, it's like I already got to this point.
Versus working on small little pieces every day.
You sort of are starting from square one.
It feels like every morning kind of thing.
So I'm going to see where this goes and I'm giving myself a lot of time.
I've worked with so much urgency and so much, but my process is so slow.
Like that a lot of it is like, for me,
it's like really helps me be patient
and not expect immediate reward and uh yeah I'm just reminding myself how much I vibe with this
kind of process uh just one thing I'm working on every day for a very long period of time
going in as deep and hard and personal as I possibly can and then what happens is what
happens it's a record of myself and I trust the
process enough and have enough history to know that like no matter what it's going to be interesting
and you know quote unquote good. But deep down I want it to be like a breakthrough like the most
amazing thing you've ever seen in your life. I hope that comes through in some of my work sometimes
but I really try to push my work as hard as i
can i that's just the way i approach art making it's not like i'm trying to make comfortable
images or pretty things it's like i'm trying to like blow your mind or like really push
the limits of my my thinking and my my capabilities and my technique um so a lot of that is actually just like the art of just like pushing yourself really hard. So that's what I'm literally looking at
it on my desk right now. But it's like, just, yeah, you can look at my work generally and just
see like very fine line work, lots of moving parts, lots of like unexpected transformations,
and all that hopefully like reflects the way I approach
making the work, which is like really deeply thoughtful. Yeah. So there's so many things that
we could talk about from all of that. And I think it gives a lot of what you said,
gives a lot of insight to who you are as a person and as an artist. And I think the first thing that I want to highlight
or maybe dive a little bit deeper into
from what you said is the slow pace of your work.
I think that something that like Kips and I
and other interviewers or other artists
in these interviews have talked about a lot
is that things take a lot of time.
Like I find myself even getting frustrated today
being like, oh man, like work is slow I find myself even getting frustrated today being like,
oh man, like work is slow right now or whatever. And like, I need like, I need it to speed up, but like you're spending literal years, like a whole year at a time working on single pieces
sometimes. And I think people can learn a lot from that. Like in the sense that like, sometimes
we shouldn't go at things fast. Like we have to be patient and slow down. And, like in the sense that like sometimes we shouldn't go at things fast,
like we have to be patient and slow down. And, but on the other hand, you're explaining to me
that like you've had this sense of urgency and the two kind of like contradict each other.
And I would be curious to like hear a little bit more on like a practical level, like how those
two have worked out in your life, like how you've taken things slow and been at peace with that, but then also like fought with the fact that like you want
to release things rapidly. Does that make sense? Yeah, totally. I think that dichotomy is a big
part of the work. I mean, also you're saying the process is slow, but the work literally is very
like fast, right? My work is usually very quickly paced so there's also that contradiction where i'm
spending a really long time on these pieces and then the end result when i'm what i'm looking
for in the work is something that's very quick um so yeah i think that's interesting there's
different ways to approach it first of all just say i agree with you that obviously spending more
time on a piece and a work is generally a good thing.
There's a lot of value in sort of like working quickly and expressively and not overthinking it.
But as a professor, and yeah, I'm in the space too, and see how other artists approach their work.
Like it is very hard to slow down and spend a long time on something.
And a lot of what I do with my students is that like,
now go back in and work on it more or like rework that part,
or we're going to spend a whole year on this one film,
like a 90 second film. And they're like, no, I could do it in a month.
It's like, no, I'm going to make you spend a year on it.
So what happens to that work over a year?
And every single one of them learns like the value in that right
that like you have time to really reflect on what you're doing you have time to like not
like any decision you you really have the time and the freedom to like make every single decision
and when that's the case it can be a lot harder because there's a lot more decision making and
choices and thought and you know
and a lot of my students a lot of what I do is just motivate them to keep going and that so much of the artistic process feels like you're stuck or like you're you're hitting your head against
the wall and it's really you only learn it through experience that like you actually have to go
through that and the best work comes through pushing through those types of moments and that you need to learn to
go to the studio and work for eight hours even when you're not excited about what you're doing
or you feel confused or you hate what you're working on and if you can keep working through
those feelings and keep pushing like that's how you achieve greatness I think. I'll also just say, for me, it was an easy choice because I realized
early on that the more time I spend on something, the better it is, and that there's no way I can
make work like this without just going through the steps. And I'm constantly reminding myself
and relearning that you can't fake it. So like, you you know with the piece i'm working on now where
it's like oh i have this setup i just posted this you used it for the promo promo for this where the
the hands are like surrounding the eyes right it's like that's a really provocative image and
like i could see this going in a lot of different directions um i have an idea what i want to do
here so for the next day i'm going gonna just do this and then like after I do
like two or three drawings I do I always change direction like it's always different from what I
plan like there is no point for me in in planning ahead too much because when I just do it like
execute on a plan it always falls flat that's somewhere deep in my what i'm i guess i'm looking for in my work where i don't want it to
feel obvious or i don't want to see my own i'm trying to like go deeper than myself or escape
myself in a way and it's like when i can see jake in the work like planning what he's doing and
trying to say something it's cringe for me it's like oh that's not that's not even that's not
real expression that's you trying to express yourself.
You're not actually expressing yourself.
And so that's just what it takes.
It's just going to take a really long time.
And even my like five second additions that are, you know, like my most collected work
because they're additions, those are 120 frames. And like, I spend months on those where it's sort of like frame to frame,
just perfectionism is the wrong word because I don't believe in like perfect or whatever,
but just like really pushing it until it feels right and clicks. And for me, that just takes
a lot of work. And I have made peace with that. And I do think now, yeah, in the current environment we live in, it's very hard to slow down. And then especially, obviously, in the crypto space, it's like war speed. It's crazy.
And I do, I find that it's, it's a blessing in disguise in a lot of ways that my work takes so much effort, because I've literally had to sit, you know, I've had a lot of great opportunities put before me.
And generally it's just like, I don't have the time to do that.
So no, or, you know, I only,
I've only minted nine one of ones in four years.
And, and almost all of them are like one minute pieces that take like a year
to make. So in my mind, whatever, it's like,
you should have more one of ones or like list more
affordable work or whatever it's like no I don't have it or like and then when I spend a year on
something like that deeply it's like I'm not just going to make it in you know an open edition I
care so much about the work so I feel like every piece I make is such a big part of my body of
work and it's so meaningful to me and I think that's that's a healthy for me way to approach
this space where I know a lot of
people are talking about post-scarcity and just meant every single thing you do and um
yeah that's what works for me um now from a practical standpoint like I again I just want
to say how hard it is like most working artists don't have the luxury to just like experiment on
something for a year and hope it works out um and it's easier now that i'm older and like sort of
like found success and have more stability but yeah when i was in my 20s and stuff and doing that
it was a really deep sense of belief in myself um and this feeling that growing up it's like
when you're in school ever you have job you know it's like i never had time to just like
really focus on something and work full time on my art and if i just get that chance i'll i can
show the world what i can do and that is a lot of what my 20s felt like it was like all right
you work nine to five now you have the rest of your life.
You can do whatever you want.
And I was like, I'm going to sit in my house and draw as much as possible.
I make the best work I can.
And really, that's where the animations came from.
Like I started as a painter and a drawer.
I never studied animation.
But the animations came out of what we're talking about here.
It was like, wow, I put so much into one piece.
And then I can put it on the internet now because they're streaming video and
they're social media for the first time. And I just sort of developed.
So that's the second part of my answer is social media makes this long form
process a lot easier for me. Like I'm saying,
I can release still frames at least a little bit. So it's like,
I'm not just making this in my room and
nobody knows what it exists like this it's real I just put this picture a part
of it out there so for me that sort of like makes it real and we'll see if I do
it with this piece but for a lot of the one minute pieces like open eyes and
brainwave and a bunch of the other pieces I have posted like five second
clips of them as I make them um and if you've
seen my work again like five second clip I think is like its own work of art in its own right
but then when you see that it's all interconnected to this one giant piece when it's all made um
it's still like hits it's not like I'm really giving it away necessarily um but I have found
that for me psychologically is really useful where once if I spend like three months on something and I haven't shared it with anyone besides
you know my wife, it does feel like is this thing even real? Or am I like hallucinate? Am I like
delusional? You know and so just being able to share it is awesome. And then I'll just say too
I think a lot of artists agree with this but it's like
you know when the work is done you still feel like it takes so long to kind of like come to
terms with that or wrap your mind around it or really feel like you really understand it or can
step away from it and move on from it um but so many of the pieces that I sell generally like
open eyes it still hasn't been listed as a one but i plan to eventually uh it's like by the
time i list it it's like i i it's fine i can let it go like i'm finally past it um uh but
yeah so that's just the way i approach art making i do think i said that it's funny i said a lot of
stuff earlier in my career that about 3d animation specifically, that I think is really applicable to what we're seeing with AI now.
And to me, you know, being an animator, especially hand-drawn animator, like the story of animation is sort of like the steps of making the process easier and faster and more commercially like affordable.
And what I do, the hand drawn slow animation
is like the antithesis of that.
So I've always understood my work
in sort of in contrast with the mainstream commercial art.
And yeah, what I used to say about 3D animation,
I still believe this is sort of like,
it removes the hand from the work.
It's usually very slick, smooth very polished almost like hyper
hyper perfect kind of feeling it can feel to me like loses a lot of soul and
then my work is like the antithesis of that it's a messy it's handmade it's
you can see the physicality of it in the image and I think it's there's something
really important about that
and something really human and timeless about that
that I don't see captured in 3D animation.
And obviously there's so much great work
that's done in 3D,
but I still watch like hand-drawn feature films.
And to me, there's a poetry or an art to it.
You know, we just saw it with the Ghibli stuff,
but there's like a real an art to it. We just saw it with the Ghibli stuff. But there's a real artistry there that, frankly,
I don't get from some of the newer 3D films.
And now you see with AI, it's the same conversation.
It's sort of like, yes, a lot of what I could do artistically
could be sped up, or there's a lot of different ways
to be creative faster.
But I just see my work in conversation
or in contrast to that, that like
in the world where everything is AI and everything with a click of a button, anyone can animate
anything. Then the really slow personal hand-drawn animation is even more valuable, even more
meaningful, even more important, even more timeless. And so I really do see myself, you know, as a sort of this like bridge generation
of like born before the internet, born before really, you know, just the beginning of personal
computers through to where we are now with AI and going into the future. And it's like,
I'm holding on to sort of these traditional values of prior generations, my inspiration, my heroes growing up.
While also in my world, I'm still, I'm very, I'm a digital artist, right?
So it's like, I, my work is, is internet native.
I sell my work as, you know, digital tokens on the blockchain.
Like my work physically is actually destroyed. It only exists digitally.
So I feel
like I'm inhabiting both worlds and like that's a way for me to like yeah exist in on sort of two
planes at the same time I even though yeah and even though I work really long on my pieces and
it's slow I still post like art on you know Twitter every day and again feel very active
on it in a daily sense like with what's going on and try to find you know, Twitter every day. And again, feel very active on it in a daily sense,
like with what's going on and try to find, you know, be inspired every day by what's going on
and put it into the work. Yeah. And I, there's a couple things again that like, I want to ask
about with what you just said. And the first thing is kind of taking it back to the
beginning of the conversation where you talked about your flip books. And as you were talking
about that, I thought about being a little kid. Like this is like a real experience. I was probably
five or six and someone showed me, maybe it was in preschool or like early elementary school.
I feel like it was preschool, actually.
Someone showed me a flip book, an empty one.
And they showed me that I could like draw a stick figure, like a piece of like a stick figure on each page and then cycle through it and it would move.
And I remember that being probably my first like introduction to art and creativity.
And for me, like I still will goof off in the same realm now as an adult when it comes to exploring.
And I wonder how much does like child like child like creativity or wonder affect like your process in your day, in your
day-to-day art? Like, is that something that you think about? Is it something that popped up for
me as I was listening to you talk and then like, just like reflecting a little bit more on your
work through this conversation? Yeah, I think that's a huge part of it. I've talked explicitly
about a lot, again, with my kids. A lot of my recent work is really inspired by my children and being around them and I I love kids so I'll just say when I worked in the museum
for almost 10 years a lot of what I did was K through 12 and I mean high school is kind of
older but they're still really young and finding themselves and figuring out the world but I find
I get so much more out of talking about art with people like that
because there's no pretense.
They can be honest and reflective about what they're seeing.
And a lot of they,
they're not as like blinded by how they should see the world or what they
should think.
And so when they're making art or we're looking at art
and they're talking about it, I find that it's much more kind of a pure human reaction or take.
And if you work, I've worked with like thousands of young people now, college students, and you
start to see patterns in human beings. And when you teach art and study art, I studied art history
and I've been teaching art my whole life. you start to see patterns and you start to understand art on sort of like a
fundamental human level and what what kind of ties us all together and that um there are sort of rules
to expression in a lot of ways um but yeah being experimental artists a lot of it art is play for
me and a lot of what i do in the classroom with students is getting them to like the word experiment can sound transfer, but it's like to just play.
Right. Not to know exactly where you're going to do things that don't have rules.
So it's like you're not making a short film about characters and blah, blah.
It's like, no, make an experimental film, non-narrative. Thatative that's three minutes long use these materials you have this much time to do it um that sort of approach to
art making where it's like figure something out and make something cool out of it uh is that is
the fun that is what art making is to me fundamentally it's like the human being
in the forest or in the cave they're well fed they're you know they're rested they don't need to do
anything what do they do with themselves take some sticks take some materials make something
right um and that is what art i mean honestly what art making really is for me it's like a
compulsion where uh that's the way i feel it's like and even today now i mean usually i have like
i'm working on projects and i have a career and I'm thinking like long-term about things.
But generally, if like I have nothing to do and I am bored, which it's not something I experienced much anymore with kids and all that.
But like, it's like, I just want to draw or make a flip book or paint something or, or build with blocks or like, right.
Like that's my, to me, that's how i i like interact with the world and figure things
out and mess around and it's always been kind of i thought you're going to go in the structure
you didn't really but like with the flipbook as a kid like it's magic and it's always felt magical
to me not just animation but just drawing like i have this pen i have this piece of paper i'm
going to go sit over here for an hour and then come back and show you this thing it's like it's
me my brain the past hour of me thinking
and messing around on a piece of paper and here take it it exists forever it's like the craziest
thing in the world um and it's always felt super like revealing to myself where speaking, just other forms of communication,
I always feel like I have something to communicate,
I communicate it, but with drawing and art making,
so I was like, whoa, that's me.
Like this is coming out of me.
I'm like finding myself through doing it.
So that magic is awesome.
And then you have seen with my kids now,
which is, I think I have a special skill as a father
where like my kid is like, I don't know what to do with myself where I can like, come up with a game, come up with a narrative or story or something to do like the, and always again with students who are hitting a wall, or aren't inspired or whatever, like my whole job has been to be like, what about this? Or like, I just saw you were talking about this yesterday. What about this? Or looking through your sketchbook, it's like, oh, you want to do this?
Just like finding ways to motivate action and people to make stuff.
And yeah, not to get too heavy or deep.
I think creativity is so important for human beings.
It's happiness and health.
And in general, I think a lot of the anxiety and depression we see out in the world in
modern life has to do with people who don't
have an outlet to play or or yeah and so teaching art to adults so to say like I taught all types
of classes but I also taught summer courses and night courses to non-matriculated students at my
university so basically like anyone like, audit a class.
And so it was mostly working professionals, adults who didn't like their job
and wanted to move into the animation field,
or they wanted to learn the skill for their, you know, for their job,
and their job is paying for this class.
And I found with adult students, professionals,
they were, like, the least creative or, like, they were like the least creative
or like the hardest to motivate
or the most defeatist or cynical,
the hardest to like draw out to speak honestly
about art that we were looking at as a class.
It's like very, like they had their guard up
and I mean, they were taking a class with me.
So you think about all the people out there who would never even step into an art classroom as adults but and yet also teaching in a museum
again kids figure it out get excited when you get them excited and can talk about art and love to go
there with adult tours and groups where adults feel like I don't you know I don't have an artistic
bone in my body or I know nothing about art or I don't get art.
You can see how uncomfortable they are in the museum
and how much work it takes to open them up
and to get them to, it's like so cheesy,
but to see, to use their eyes, to just like get past their brain
or themselves and then when we make art in the studio again,
again, very difficult for them.
If I say we're going to make self-portraits,
it's like looking at myself in a mirror
and drawing myself for 30 minutes
is like, it sounds like pure torture
to these people, right?
Whereas I see it as like,
oh my God, think about how healthy that is for you.
Like to sit for 30 minutes
and look at yourself and draw yourself.
Like it feels like to me,
it's like medicine. So yeah, think that childlike wonder is is awesome i'll just wrap up this answer real
quick to say what i'm really interested with my my kids is just the way they see and the way they
they're the narratives that they're interested in and the way they create stories. And my work is so much of it is about vision and movement.
And I think even though my work might be really complicated
and dense with imagery,
like I do think I'm playing with like really fundamental themes
and symbolism, generally like figures, landscapes growing, morphing, evolving,
really high contrast forms and shapes,
you know, movement.
When I break down everything I'm doing,
it's like things are getting bigger and smaller,
moving side to side, up and down, you know,
towards you, away from you, around in a circle, back and forth.
It's like, and I really like to think of my work that way.
That's like, like the piece that you that you again you use to promote this chat it's like it's eyes with
hands around their eyes like when i'm playing with my baby that's like half of what i'm doing
it's just like staring at her with my hands in my eyes and manipulating them and making faces and
it's like that's what we're wired as people to react to that's how we communicate that's how we
see the world um and i'm very consciously tapping into that as an artist. So maybe like tapping into that kind of like primitive mind in my viewer.
And I have one more question and then I want to pass it over to Kips just to be somewhat mindful of our time.
But I guess, and this is a big just like, I don't want to say
constantly like pursuing like joy and wonder, but like in a sense, I think that's what you're doing.
And for me, that's even though I get discouraged a lot, I think it's easy for me to be positive and
like find the good and the joy in the world. But a lot of people can't do that. Like I get that
like part of your practice is drawing and exploration
and, like, being creative, but, like, yeah, how do you not get hardened by the things of this world,
if you will? Yeah, whatever. I'm flattered that you think I'm not hardened, so thank you.
I think that's a really good question, and I think especially in this space, I will say being in this space, right? There's so much, you see so much bad character or like things that disappoint you and other people. And I'm saying this space, but really because I'm on Twitter so much, like it's the world, right? Politics and popular culture and the general attitudes of a lot of people.
A lot of people, I would say a couple of things.
First of all, I don't see my, I've always struggled with this because like, I don't
see myself as like a happy go lucky person, but a lot of people talk about me as someone
who's positive and, you know, I'm a teacher.
So like, that's kind of like the role.
But I, I want to make the world a better place.
So I definitely don't see the world as like a place that doesn't need to be made better.
So part of me, I'm just motivated to be a positive force on the world and leave something
positive behind because I care about people and myself and humanity.
Kids make it a lot easier.
I will say for all the hardships that come with having family and taking care of kids and like they give
me so much meaning and I can't wake up in a bad mood and take it out you know that's kind of
this is my story yeah so every morning I wake up I'm tired I'm uh a little stressed about all the
things I want to do that day and blah blah blah um blah. And then my five-year-old's already up playing, waiting for me.
And she's just so fun and funny.
It's just like, okay, we're in it.
And I don't have time to think about anything.
Like, I don't have time to be sad.
We got to get ready for school and go to school.
And then it just gives me so much.
It's sort of like, it's cheesy, but it's like, that's enough, truly.
The other feeling i have
is when i walk into the classroom um that's stressful because it's sort of like you're
performing and it's you're going into something and you want to be prepared um and you have all
these people look you know especially college students can be so guarded and things and you
want um and generally when i find with like i in the classroom, I got 20 students looking at me, I'm guiding the room for five hours.
It's like my natural, like motivator comes out.
I can't stand it when people are like uninterested or depressed or bored in my
class, no fucking way that's going to happen. So it's like, I just like,
I got it.
I got to bring the mood up and we're all going to get on, you know,
up together. I'm going to be excited. And by the time you leave, you're going to be in a good mood.
And you're going to remember this class after you graduate.
And hopefully the things I'm teaching you, like you take with you.
So I really, I guess other people like really motivate me to,
to not feel hardened, to feel, to feel positive.
Cause when I am alone and I'm drawing and I'm,
I'm reading things in the world,
I guess I do find myself getting frustrated and not like super upset about things.
But I think also I'll just say like what we were saying before,
like this long form process and being an artist,
it's something I've chosen to do with my life.
But like we said, like I'm aware that it's like healthy for me.
It's like every day I get to express myself,
put myself out on a page, leave a mark that like I did something that day that's permanent.
And I just think that gives me so much peace of mind. And it does now that I'm, you know, I'm 40 years old. It's like, I can look back. It's like, I've been pursuing this for, you know,
professionally, I'll take 20 years, like doing this every day for like 30, 40 years.
It's like I can see my life.
I can see what I've done.
And I don't feel like I don't feel like a nobody.
I don't feel like I haven't accomplished anything.
I take a lot of pride in like what I've already accomplished.
And that's something really nice about aging or being older is like,
I feel a lot less anxiety about proving myself to the world.
And I feel like now I, I just have like time to,
like every day is a gift. I have more time.
Like I have all these skills. I've developed all these,
this practice. And it's like,
now I have all this time to like explore and make stuff with like a,
as a mature person with like,
feeling like I'm at the top of my game.
I feel like so much of my artistic life has been like trying to get better,
trying to be, you know, and I still always am, but, um,
trying to make it in a sense. Um, and now, yeah,
I feel like I'm gen it's art is the answer for me.
It's like, I'm genuinely excited about tomorrow,
the future. I feel like again, in the space, like nothing that happens in the space could,
could break me. Uh, like if it all, like, um, it's permanent record of my art. It's on chain.
It's like, there's all this history and whether things go up or down or the mood is high or low generally it's like i'm still making art every day and i can add into this
history i've made all these friends and have all these connections that are real and lasting i have
all these collectors out in the world um so yeah when eth isn't performing well or everyone on the
timeline is complaining about every aspect of things or, you know, if work isn't
selling as well as I'd like or whatever, I have a longer term mindset and I feel really
proud and like confident in the work that I'm doing and the work that I have done.
I genuinely am proud.
So I kind of feel like maybe that's something I would tell my students is like,
find a way that you're actually proud of yourself and feel like you're accomplishing something worthwhile.
Cause like that is the secret to like not letting the world bring you down. No one can take that from you.
Man, those are, those are powerful words, Jake. And I, yeah, like, I, I just want to thank you for just sharing all of that. Like,
I think that, like, it sounds cliche, but in a lot of ways, it feels like medicine to the soul.
So I appreciate you just like being honest and vulnerable. And yeah, like, there's really not
much that I can add to that other than to just say thank you.
And I think on a less important note, I'll pass it over to Kips.
It's like that's anticlimactic.
How do you follow that up, Kips? You would not shut up.
Oh, my God.
How do you follow that up?
By trying to ask my questions.
You wouldn't give me a chance.
You're going to fucking ask him about potato chips
after he just talked about healing the world.
Let me ask you, what is the meaning of life?
Like, that's what you do.
I love it.
It was great.
It is great because I love Jake, but this is my time.
You know, this is the only space I wanted to be at.
That's fine.
Ask about your little potato chips. It's okay. You know what? the only space I wanted to be at. That's fine. Ask about your little potato chips.
It's okay.
You know what?
Go fuck yourself.
That question is going to come later now.
I'm going to start with the serious question.
Incredible.
Yeah.
Jake, what's up, buddy?
I will start with one of my favorite questions.
It's a two-parter.
What is your favorite snack?
You're going to the pantry. You're stopping work for a little bit. You need something to noshter. What is your favorite snack? Like, you're going to the pantry.
You're stopping work for a little bit.
You need something to nosh on.
What are you grabbing?
Great question.
I got to say this before I answer that, just that based on the last question, too, like, Kips has been, we've known each other now for a few years.
Always great vibes.
Super positive.
Means so much to me.
People like you,
I see a bunch of people in the space right now. All of you bring me up. People who,
you know who they are. They're just like here for the right reasons. Good people,
enthusiastic, kind, genuine. I don't go a day.. Christopher saying not him, but definitely am.
Definitely not Chris. Definitely not.
How can I be sad? I get so much,
I have so many positive, wonderful people in my life that I respect.
And you included, and it just means so much that you've always been there.
And I see you and your work all the time. And I feel, we feel connected.
And I think that's.
We're getting really cheesy here, but that is really.
I was going to say, what are you trying to do here?
You're trying to make me tear up on this face?
I'm not a big snacker.
I have a unhelpful.
Like I my relationship with food and exercise, like I try to snack as little as possible.
I don't need more snacks in my life
um and yeah i'm actually like not a sweets guy at all in general i would say doesn't have to be
sweet yeah it can be savory it can be you know if i was going to snack on something i'd probably
be like trail mix nuts pretzels perhaps but even that, this kind of goes back to the drawing. I generally
like to kind of starve myself until I'm done drawing for the day.
And then eat more later. And even when I just go running every day, I don't like to eat too
much before I go running. But this is a large conversation about suffering and all that stuff yeah
I do kind of like to suffer for my art I know it's not it's not something I like
advise all my students or something I like talk about a lot but like to me
snacking is like gratuitous and like self pleasure. It's like giving into like, you know,
giving into some sort of like craving and a lot of like the discipline of my
drawing in a way I think is sort of like, don't do that. So yeah,
I generally like to kind of get it all out and then just like completely
collapse at the end of the day and that's when I can just
hang out with my kids and eat
and all that stuff.
I also am afraid if I start
letting myself snack, I just won't
know when to stop.
What's yours?
Yeah, that's probably for the best.
I will clear all these wrappers off my desk.
Don't mind me.
I totally don't have a snack problem. I always feel like it's like a downer, by the way,
because obviously
my kid loves treats, and
everyone loves treats, and I'm always like, I don't really want
anything. That's the problem.
When you have kids, you have this stuff in the house,
so I can try as hard as I want.
The cereal's going to be there. All the snacks are going to
be there. I have switched to dried fruit
instead of fruit snacks lately,. I feel better about that,
but it's still covered in sugar, I'm sure. Terrible for me, but
it's fruit. I'm eating fruit every day. That's got to count for something.
Go on a run with us, Kip. The second part
is when you're going out for breakfast, hitting up a diner, what is your breakfast order?
Yeah, I mean, it's kind of the same answer, right?
Something healthy.
You're like starving yourself.
I don't know what this is.
I mean, this is something you talk about with the therapist.
It's probably unhealthy,
but like I'm really not a big breakfast guy.
I'll just have no coffee.
But when I do have breakfast,
I mean, it's like last year was crazy
where, you know, you have kids, right? It's like, oh yeah crazy where uh you know you have kids right just like
oh yeah yeah so the baby just like you just don't sleep i'm so glad that part is over again for me
um but like i had to eat breakfast because my like eating schedules are all off or i was over
tired so i was hungry um but i did get addicted to just these ham and cheese croissants at this
bakery across the street and i told myself it was just like a little breakfast pastry,
but it was like a legit ham and cheese sandwich for breakfast.
It's a straight up sandwich in the morning time.
Yeah.
I think that's all right, though.
You know, croissant's light and fluffy.
It's not like you're having a bagel or anything.
I think that's all right.
Yeah, I've got to say, one of my favorite parts of where I live
is just this bakery across the street. It's like it's an Israeli bakery and they
have great food and brunch stuff and coffee. And I think I spent half my money there.
I love breakfast. Breakfast is my favorite. And I only like go out to breakfast on the weekends.
Now we start going out to breakfast with the family. So that's been nice. But I am an old
man when it comes to breakfast, like corned beef hash ash i'm getting over easy eggs now rye toast like just a straight
grandfather's breakfast order where i used to get the pancakes the drier and more like seeded
the bread the better the runnier the egg yes i mean i'm definitely getting everybody will realize
my daughter always talks about the food i love smells bad. It's like, oh, yeah, I guess I do like kind of pungent things.
It's something about our age, I think.
When you get to this ripe old age, you start craving old people food.
It just happens, guys.
You don't expect it.
It just comes on you one day.
The waitress says no strawberry top waffle today.
And I say, no, no, I think I'll just be going with the eggs.
Thank you. Uh, second question. If you could go back in time, let's say 10 years
in a time machine and you have one sentence to tell your past self, what are you telling yourself?
Yeah. I mean, I would, I like this. I have two things to say about this question my first answer is
everyone who's successful and gets this question is always like tells them i tell myself to relax
more yeah and when i was younger i always hated that answer because like the reason you're so
successful is because you were that kind of person that didn't relax enough yeah and uh again i mean
again you don't have to suffer for york like i my 20s
was like i very clearly like i didn't move to new york when a lot of people i know were moving there
i still don't live there for kind of the same reason um it's like i didn't want to be distracted
from my work and like what i could do and i you know i like to party i like to hang out with
people i like to get out there and. I like to get out there.
And I was like, I'm going to like, I, I want to, I, this is so me, you know,
like I need to work really hard at this and I want to put everything I have
into this. And, and so I wish I was more relaxed and enjoyed my life more at
that age. But I'm glad I, I understood,
I think sort of like deep down like the life cycles and i feel
like now again it's like i worked really hard for a really long time so now i can have kids have
less time to focus on myself and my work and i don't feel like i ran out of time i really felt
this need to kind of get to a certain place in my for myself before i got married had kids and all that stuff um so um i think what i
would tell myself 10 years ago now is sort of like trust the process which is like something i'm
always relearning um and that yeah maybe like don't waste time because you're gonna have kids
and you're gonna like you know you're not gonna have as much time
But you really don't realize how much your life is gonna change
so so work as hard as you can and
Yeah, I think
10 years from now, I'm gonna I would say the same thing to myself now to sort of like don't waste time I
Talking about the urgency I feel this is something that is he I feel like
is unique to me based on my conversation other people but like my life has always
felt like it's been like flying by I have the sense of time that it goes
really maybe that reflected in my work but I always feel like I'm running out
of time and that should have it. It's happening faster. Like, like the sunset is April in 2025.
I can't believe it. Like what? And, and yeah,
now, especially as I'm older and with kids,
it like really feels like I wake up, I get some work done. It's like, Oh,
school's over. I got, it's like, what the fuck?
Like, and maybe that's not being bored or like, you know,
life I guess it's a little slower when you're young.
But even when I was young, I was like, oh, my God, I'm 17.
I got to do this shit.
I'm 18.
I'm 19.
Like, what the fuck?
So I've always had this, like, don't waste time.
And that is something that bothers me about my students or just when I see people in general who are like.
Kind of this goes
back to the whole thing we've talked about the motivating people or whatever
the play like I just see people who are not urgent about their lives or like
don't care about anything and I just like I'm like what the fuck it's going
on I don't get it you're only here for like a little bit I think the feeling
once I had kids was like hey at least I did this so like I think the feeling once I had kids was like,
hey, at least I did this.
So I think that actually helped me relax a little bit.
As odd as that sounds.
And we had our son, it was like,
I've given this to the world.
I had a son.
He will carry on for a period of time beyond me,
hopefully, right?
So I think something about having kids,
maybe it's just me helped me to
to go okay at least i've got that everything else is like icing on the top yeah 100 i think part of
my story too like we didn't get into it too deeply but um in like 2020 right the year after i had my
first child it's also covered so I had to teach be a professor from
home for over a year with a baby at the house my client you know teaching is very difficult
online especially physical art and they were like five-hour courses and my work was being valued and
I was getting these high-level commissions but I know, obviously just wanted to work on my own stuff and, um,
but kind of like needing to make money and not have to
be stuck in that lifestyle and having the kid,
you know, and, and crypto kind of all came together at the same time for me. And I have realized in myself that like a lot of my motivation beyond just like
making, being the greatest artist I can, but being commercially,
financially, publicly successful matters more to me now that I have a kid.
And it's easier for me to pursue those things because it's not just for me.
That's really helpful.
helpful uh and yeah so it's like that it's it's a bit of a blessing that i can
but yeah i i agree with you too like just having kids is enough for me um but uh that everything
i do is like for them and now that she's you know she's been going all these shows with me
my my oldest for her whole life and is really aware of what I do as an artist now.
And that's really meaningful to me and special that, like, I feel like I'm being witnessed.
And she really knows me and knows what I do and is proud of my work and, you know, inspired by me.
And that makes life easier and makes you want to be a better person and
live your best life and be your best self.
So yeah, it's a gift.
They can be.
We just got a little puppy a couple weeks ago
and my daughter just called down
because she's running around and
needs to go outside.
Yeah, we were over the waking up in the middle
of the night stuff for a while with our kids, but now with this puppy.
Oh, boy.
That's another story I didn't get into.
Good luck, by the way.
I've had a Yorkie with my wife for over 10 years now.
And, yeah, he's like a little β I mean, I love him to death, obviously, but he's like this little piece of shit.
And then we have the kids, and now we have a baby again.
And it's like he's way more working frustrating than the kids, to be honest with you.
And I had to run him outside right before this call.
And I was like, can't you wait?
It's like everything he does is just a piss.
And he still, because now he eats the baby's food off the floor, you know,
wakes me up in the middle of the night to take him out.
I'm like, I just got back to sleeping through the night, like finally.
And now you're like, do it?
Yeah, dog and kids is, what kind of dog it's an adventure it's an adventure it's one of these fancy dogs is a bernie doodle oh nice they're really smart it's pretty cute
yeah it's adorable i posted a picture a little while back. She's very cute. But, you know, puppy, right?
Yeah, it's a lot of work.
We got a new house right before COVID.
And it's very nice, but it needed a lot of work.
So we got everything painted and got brand new furniture.
And it took us a long time.
And we were like, maybe we can wait a little while before having a loose animal run around and rip up this couch that I just bought.
And so we waited as long as we could. and then my wife and I were both like,
all right, the kids should have a pet.
We both had dogs and cats and stuff growing up, so we're like, all right.
So we broke down and got this little love,
and she's an adventurer every day.
Yeah.
She's quite something.
I mean, in a couple weeks, you're going to be the only one taking care of it, probably.
Yeah, the kids are good right now for the interim.
My son's been great about taking her out.
My daughter is maybe a little young to take her out on her own, but she tried earlier today, I think, right?
Yeah, so progress.
We're getting there.
She sleeps in a crate all night, which is awesome.
Like, we grew up with labs that just ran loose through the night and ran into the wall.
This is a new adventure for us. We like it. It's been good.
I think that's adorable. It's so cute. Good for you. Good luck.
Yes, thank you. Thank you. That distraction aside. My next question, really quick.
If you were given unlimited money in 12 months to make one piece of work,
I can already assume it would be doing what you're doing right now,
but what would you be doing?
Yeah, I mean, that is the answer.
It's like I don't need more money to create really what I want to create.
And that kind of was by design too.
Again, something I didn't really get into,
but being a painter can be so expensive and was just the materials and then shipping um framing and all that um
that when i really started to fall into this animation that i knew would end up on screens
on our computers i really pared down my materials and landed on usually mostly white out
dick you know sharpie markers and big pens and all that stuff i just buy
at the corner store so my art supplies are like very cheap um and even like my computer it's
crazy i mean i think i had the same iMac now for like seven years i always forget it feels brand
new to me it's like as good as it was when i got it but it used to be like every three years i got
to buy a new computer you know. So that's all pretty good.
I do think like thinking long term or bigger picture with opportunities, like a lot of people in this room or in the space have seen my work in real life.
David was talking about the museum.
But when my work is screened physically, especially like floor to ceiling or really large or building size, they just look so amazing.
So I could see in the next decade investing more on my end in hardware,
like displays, being more, you know,
usually I'm working with the curator of the space and just using what they
have.
But I do think there could be ways for me
to like be more hands-on and direct
with like kind of the physical manifestation of my work.
And again, like I see my work on like these tower
at Art Basel or like in Times Square or whatever.
It's like, if I actually did want to sell a piece
that was like this giant you know physical structure with screens on it with my work like and I had
unlimited money I could come up with some cool thoughts ideas. I would just need to find a place
to permanently install it right or someone who would want to take it from me. So actually that
is an answer like I wouldn't mind having like a warehouse space to be frank i work in my house it's been it's great with the kids and the dog obviously and i
i think i would probably always want to work primarily kind of in the sort of like study
in my home area type of thing but uh i was just in new york last month for a show uh time to be
happy gallery and they have, it's a big space
with like artist studios in the basement.
I made a painting and sold it there.
And it was last time I'd done
like a large scale painting in at least
a year. And it was really fun
and satisfying. I was like, God,
I'd love to just go back to Boston and have
like 10 giant canvases
in a big warehouse
space that I could just fuck around with and see what happens.
So something like that would be cool.
I bet you people could give you a wing, right?
He's got some space down there.
I love Boston.
I like a studio space.
I guess I could afford it, but it's so expensive for what it is.
And I'm not sure I really would use it to its full extent.
But, yeah, that is something again like i'm thinking about phases of
life like if my work continues you know my career continues to go well my kids get older like 10 20
years like having it uh more of a hub or like a real like legit big studio would be cool that's
also what's kind of fucked up like in my whole career like generally when i have like studio
visits or interview you know people come to film me and stuff.
It's like, you're coming to my house.
It's like I'm signing these prints in my house.
Like I don't have like a really cool artist studio with shit everywhere.
Even though I live here in Boston in the arts district.
So like literally across the street are artist studios.
I just don't really need it.
That's so cool that you get to live among art studios and stuff like that, too, because you're probably in a pretty metro area, I take it then.
Yeah, by choice.
Like, I really get off of, like, that energy.
And that is one of the β also a good thing about teaching for me was β this is what I tell a lot of artists.
Like, obviously, a lot of artists, most artists have to make money beyond just like they're selling their work.
It could be really hard.
So just find a job where you're around artists somehow or art or the art
industry.
Like if your date,
so I always was like,
no matter what I want a day job where like I'm surrounded by other artists.
And so teaching at a art university is a pretty
good way to do that um and i i flirted with the especially during covet obviously but like this
idea of like i can just move anywhere in the world and do what i do it doesn't matter
why do i live in this like really expensive city and with like traffic and um what am i doing especially in the winter uh recently but um
i do when i when i go um on a vacation somewhere that is more like bucolic or peaceful or quiet
i do feel the sense of like i can't make art just in like probably in the middle of nowhere like i
actually find like i'm making art for the world in the city and it's
around me right now and I feed off of that and I do think I'm very influenced by my environment so
I chose an environment that I think like kind of vibes with the way I like to to work and you
mentioned you obviously like having kids has changed the way you look at art the way you make
art probably like I don't want to drag on for too long because I value your time too but what kind
of influence has having kids had on just your process and your work yeah so I've mentioned
this like very explicitly like with if you see my work like baby eyes or new life or um my edition
good night moon it's like very hopefully kind of obvious that they're related to childhood or babies.
And so one thing that I really, how do I put this plainly?
Books like Good Night Moon or songs like Wheels on the Bus are like so universally popular with infants.
That there must be, it's not just like culture.
It's not like we just put it on these kids and we accept it.
Like they, they actually like, it actually clicks with them really.
And like, and so thinking about children's books and children's songs and nursery rhymes and fairy tales these
these structures that are like they're almost universal truths like of the collective unconscious
in my mind and then watching a lot of um then working on my work and listening to pop music
or listening to experimental electronic music which i like like a lot, or jazz, and watching a lot of films,
I've been struck over and over the last five years,
like, it's all the same shit.
It's all this, it's like everything, visual culture,
is sort of like figured out in the first two years of life.
It's like, it's all there.
And then we just sort of expand on it and complicate it or
make details are going to you know see it from different directions but like what are these
fundamentals of vision of story of expression what is what is satisfying to the human mind
and so in my work I think I have a tendency to like get complicated, dense, detailed.
And so a lot of what having kids,
I think directly as an artist has inspired me
to really try to push back on that impulse.
That like simplicity is key.
Simplicity, the basics that like,
we are human beings with bodies, the way we like see the world
the way we interact the way we read symbols what is satisfying to us as a like beginning middle
and end all that kind of stuff like really try to focus on that and i really do feel like
it's funny because my work can be kind of fast and stroby, but like babies, like young kids really dig my work.
Again, I've taught a lot of kids and showed my work to kids and seeing my daughter, like you can imagine my.
If you see my work, so like, you know, adults have their cell phones out all the time these days and kids.
Usually they just it's like it looks like boxes or text or fly by.
But it's like if one of my pieces is on my phone and my baby is crawling past, she's really into it.
It draws her in.
She crawls towards it.
Or my daughter or her friends, when they're over at the house and they see my prints or my lenticular print and stuff, it's like, whoa, this is cool.
What is this?
It's like, yeah, that's kind of what I'm doing.
It's like you're in this house.
There's all this stuff around.
You're used to being alive in the world.
You're five.
But this thing is interesting and weird and different and is like, calling me. And it's like, that is actually all I'm kind of trying to do here as an
artist. And you guys might not see like a larger art historical reference or understand maybe some
of the pain or pathos in this work. but like you kind of, it's like,
I think as an artist, like you kind of need to do that every day when you're making art,
like what is art? What am I making? What am I doing? Why am I doing this? What is it for?
And I just made, I sort of spent eight hours drawing hands crumbling together with eyeballs
popping out.
Why did you do that?
And why do you want other people to see that?
I think, yes, just having kids has kind of reinforced a lot of that for me.
I also, I mean, I could go in so many directions with this.
I also just see the way, maybe more than us as adults,
kids like really fall in love with certain content and like to consume it over and over again.
And I really find that fascinating.
And I try to do that myself.
I think in our scrolling kind of culture, low attention span,
meta is always changing culture.
Like people don't look back enough or spend time with work enough.
So there's certain books like I try to read every year and I listen to
certain albums.
I tend to be now like more of like,
I have like 10 albums that I'm always listening to rather than like,
yes, where I used to be like, what's on pitchfork? And like, what's the new withdrawal this week? And I got to listen to rather than like this where I used to be like what's on pitchfork
and like what's the new withdrawal this week and I gotta listen to everything once um being like
I'm old I don't have enough time to ever watch every new show or movie anymore I'm completely
out of touch with like popular music right to a certain degree so it's like what do I really love
and what I want to surround myself what kind of work and I see that with my kids too. And I, I am just noticing the
way that they take comfort in the repetition. And yeah, I'll just say it plainly. Like, why am I,
why do I post on Twitter every day? Like, I actually think psychologically, like it's good
for my work and my audience that like seeing it every day is different than just seeing it once
and moving on. It's like, oh, I saw a Jake Fre free piece in a museum that was cool but when and i know this looking
at certain artists in this you know in this space right now and a lot of other artists in the space
in nfts and beyond nfts just like when i'm seeing their work every day or every week like
it becomes part of my daily visual culture and I have a deeper connection
with the work. And, um, a lot of times it takes me a long time to really, I appreciate work more
deeply when I get to spend a lot of time with it. Um, so I'm trying to make work.
This is so lofty that I'm afraid to say it out loud, but I'm trying to make work that's like timeless.
That is like twinkle, twinkle, little star that is like.
You know.
I spy spot book or something like just something that's so like singular and had to exist.
And just like you can see it every, you know know maybe once a week and it's not like boring
or older you're over it's sort of like it has it has life or juice or something always to offer i
don't know if that makes sense but i i really don't want to make like disposable cultural objects
like um or trendy things i'm trying to make like, yeah, substantial, point my flag works. Um,
I could probably keep going for a long time with this, but I'll stop there.
But yeah, a lot of it is about that, of that simplicity and timelessness.
I love it. I don't know if we lost Kips to his puppy. Are you still there?
He, uh, oh, wait, maybe. Oh man. Kips is down. His, his dog must've got him or something.
This is a good reminder. Um, also just like spontaneity or like losing control.
So also, I can draw at night.
I can draw sometimes on the weekends.
Like there are periods where my kids go play with friends and my wife,
and I'm like, I have some free time.
And then like shit happens or whatever, like we've been talking.
My work takes a lot of focus and um as a
younger man if like i was interrupted as much as i am now during my process i would have lost my
shit like i wouldn't be able to handle it and i think a lot of the past years for me has been
learning how to like click in and click out really quickly like if i'm drawing up until the minute
my daughter gets home from school,
like I need to be able to put the pen down and be done with it.
And for me, that is like leaving like a different head space.
Like I'm going, time really does like,
does not exist when I'm drawing, when I'm really into it.
And it's like coming out of, you know it's like coming yeah coming out of a dream
like in a second and then being able to like just like exist in the real world and then likewise
i have 30 minutes i can get something done like clicking out of real life into that world um and
just getting there it's something that i think is a learned skill that i'm getting better at uh every day and
also does feel really healthy it's like self-control i can like
again i think a lot of people may maybe relate with like meditation but it does feel kind of
like a buddhist monk thing where it's like if you can go from like talking with people to like
a deep meditation i'm like five minutes you know that's like guru level kind of like mind control
self-control um so that is something that i've also like kind of just had to i think learn as an
artist um and am i back kips is back he's back baby yeah yeah baby all right i heard everything that was super
frustrating i heard it all very good stuff uh my question where i left off was uh a documentary
that i enjoy the art of the steel from 2010 nine somewhere not to be confused with the art of the
deal yeah no god no this fucking guy Anyway, it's about the Barnes Foundation.
I don't know if you're familiar with that whole story or documentary or the info behind it.
But as an art history teacher, I was curious your thoughts.
Is that the guy who collected the impressionist paintings and metal fixtures?
He collected the most incredible collection of art you could ever fathom right and when he
died he wrote this will that was basically like this is how this art should be treated for the
next century right he had a huge foundation endowed it with all this money and the story
of the documentary just follows how corrupt people got their hands on the art and it got
distributed to all these places he never wanted it to be so i think my question is around like provenance and digital blockchain stuff and maybe
controlling where your art ends up to some degree like do you think that's an important thing for an
artist for a collector what are your thoughts on that generally yeah so if i recall barns like
um i think what really attracted me to a story of a museum, I've been there, it's in Philly, correct?
Yes.
I've been there many, many, many, many years ago.
It was just like the way it was hung was so unique, right?
And I think that's really cool because that's, again, talking about like adults or the way we see the world like a lot of people just take for granted the way art is displayed in the museum and how there's so much cultural baggage there and that it wasn't
always displayed that way for and that like again looking at egyptian artifacts and like a white
cube gallery with like fluorescent lights is like obviously not how that art was ever intended to be
viewed and um to see impressionist paintings hung museums have actually stolen from this and kind of gotten back a little bit more to the roots but like hanging the impressionist paintings that get hung museums have actually stolen from this and kind
of gotten back a little bit more to the roots but like hanging the impressionist paintings the more
like they would have been hung when the artist made them on wallpaper you know a little bit
lower to the ground um with the lighting um brighter um but i just think that's really cool
so if people don't know like the museum has like these paintings with like candelabras installed next to them in a way you would never see in a modern museum, really.
I also just remember that he kind of bought what he loved and didn't care too much about.
He was ostracized.
Yeah.
Like the galleries, the museums are all like worthless art, like criticized and left, right and center.
And then obviously 50 years later, got their hands on it.
So to me, that's the most romantic kind of story of a collector in this space right now, thinking ahead.
And the collectors that I'm most attracted to are who actually have a point of view and are being smart about it,
but clearly are collecting what they think is the best work, regardless of price or hype.
And that's the way I collect.
Now, I mean, it's not like you just,
and they're collecting with a lot of thought
and they're collecting stuff
that they don't think they're ever gonna sell
or get rid of.
This space is still figuring itself out it's
never been easier to sell art you own right and i do think like if it was that easy to sell art you
own in the physical art world like a lot of the world would reflect what's happening here more
than it does um and a lot of people say like galleries jobs isn't a way to like stop that
and i don't know if that's good or bad necessarily so i'm um i like to collect
collectors that kind of stupid phrase right it's like i've been thoughtful about who has my work
and tried to avoid situations where uh i think people who don't have my best you know don't have
the best intentions are like major collectors of mine you can't really control a lot of that but
generally with my drops i've tried to reward existing holders
or people that I already know or communities.
And, you know, the spaces slow down so much.
We don't see as much of that as we used to,
but we still see a lot of it
where it's just like,
you don't just like release a piece
and let anyone just buy it
because it attracts too many flippers or whatever.
But it goes back and forth. And I specifically remember in 2022,
there was a period where it was a brief moment where art really was like the
meta because PFDs had come down,
maybe memes or other things were not at the high yet.
And it was like, Oh my God,
a lot of these people collect my art clearly
just it's because it's hyped and um they want to flip it or they don't know what else to do it in the space right now um where they're just following influencers or whatever and uh
it's like i'm happy to make sales right but it did get to a point where it's like i'm there i
have collectors and then these other collectors and like these are the a point where it's like, I have collectors and then these other collectors. And like, these are the other collectors where it's like, we're not going to have meaningful conversations about the work and DMs. They're probably going to be like kind of rude to me or treat me like a project founder or the way I assume it is to feel like one of these project founders or devs on a meme project it's like you're basically just like a punching bag they just want money out
of you right they don't care about you or the work um but uh that's part of life and that is
part of the art world too right and um so generally though i feel really happy about where my work
lives and long term the provenance of it it's uh this space allows for that so i just want to reiterate
that again because i feel like we got so far away from sort of like for me like the founding reason
the space is so amazing what's happening here but before you know nfts i would release a piece i
would post it on my website i post it on video on Instagram, YouTube, Facebook. It would be republished on blogs. It would be screened at a concert. It would be licensed for a TV show. It would be on Reddit. It would be used without my permission for music videos on YouTube. It would be screened at a bunch of, you know, raves and EDM shows without permission.
It just sort of like was all over the place, right?
It's a work of art, but it's like lives everywhere.
It has no object hood, except maybe like the original, I mean, the file on my computer,
but like it's the same file being spread all over the world.
So once it can be minted on chain, it's like it becomes an actual art object in all regards.
And it still exists everywhere else.
And like we know with memes and nomadics,
like it's good that it exists everywhere else.
It only brings value back to the true one original piece.
And that everyone can publicly see who's collected it,
how much it's listed for, where it's been traded.
If you want to buy it, just turn on your computer and go do it.
If you want to watch, you know, watch it,
or it's like it's right there.
And it's, that to me is like the provenance.
And then there's like funny story.
It's like, who I was talking to the other day kevin rose i did a proof grail kevin rose bought it talked about it like even went on
bloomberg and news and like talked about my work but when he when he dropped out of the space i
guess or whatever happened uh he sold that piece and it's like the person who bought it was like i got the kevin roses
you know jake freed proof graphs like i guess that you know does that add value or not but it's like it's part of the story and it's in a way that like you would really probably never see with digital
art in like the traditional gallery context um so i think it it it makes all of it more real
and that was my big thing i think when i I first was learning about Ethereum and then I sees my whole thing, I was like, is this real?
It's actually like, is this like tech actually work?
And for me, a lot of what the past four years has been is like, oh my, the test case, it's real.
It's like my first Mint in July will be four years old.
You'll look at an OpenSea.
There's only one out of 60 editions listed.
There's a one of one that's listed
for like 2,000 Ethereum or something.
And there's been like,
you know, like 100,000 plus
at least USD
and secondary volume.
It's like, this is a body of work
that was released at Super Cheat Gallery in 2021.
If it wasn't like tokenized,
it would be this, it's like I had a show, yeah, in 2021.
And this was the work that went and bought it.
But it's like, no, it's live.
It's like right there today.
You can see it.
All the history is there.
To me, that's so cool.
And something that's really motivated me
to like take this space seriously right off the bat.
And I believe we're still in that phase of like, this is,
this is historical early times and like a new revolution art movement.
And it's going to be so cool in 30,
40 years to like, I have some, you know,
art collections that are some like legitimate, like earliest, like legitimate art that I think will still be highly, like you're saying, David, from the beginning of this conversation, but like will be in museums.
And it will like have proven itself over decades that this is the best system for art provenance.
And who knows how long it's going to take the world to evolve probably
shorter than we think but like i think everything's going to be tokenized like this um like
high value unique objects at least or fine art uh within our lifetimes it'll be a commonplace so to
have something early that had a lot of i I also, so talking about kits like collectors, secondary,
when I first got in the space and I saw all these secondary sales, it was like, the fuck,
I got so sad when people would sell my work. Cause I thought like every collector is a collector of
my work. Like you're my collector. And then I have learned over time. It's like, you know,
you can be really close to the collector for a year and they can just wake up and sell your work.
And they're still your friend.
They still played a big role in your career or whatever,
but they don't own your work. Like technically don't own your work. Um,
and that is like,
I can't prioritize you as much as other people who are like, you know,
like, so, um, I got really kind of bummed about it.
And I've learned, I've made a lot of peace with it at this point where I actually, especially the last couple of years, like secondary volume is kind of a healthy sign that like people care about my work, that there is like liquidity in it.
that right now the way I'm feeling like
there's been a lot of time and we've seen it um and for things to just die and go to zero and be
completely forgotten um and that is something too that saddens me where it's like a lot of my
friends who are not super in the space anymore who released stuff in 2021 it's like I bought
their work enthusiastically but the fact that there's been no attention on the projects
nothing from them because they're not really like here anymore no volume or transaction it's sort of
like i still love the work it's still something i collected it's like there's no it doesn't feel
like it's alive or something um so the fact that my work still has secondary volume and usually i
don't make royalties on it anymore unfortunately but i still like show my my still has secondary volume and usually i don't make royalties on it anymore
unfortunately but i still like show my my shit on secondary all the time i still like seeing when it
sells um i i do like seeing floor prices go up even though again it's all like it's all bs right
like anybody can lower the price and just sell whenever they feel like it like it does but um
and so many of the it's kind of crazy
now it's almost like we found a flaw on the blockchain where like every five seconds there's
a bot bidding like 0.0001 eth over the top bid on all my collections so now i gotta look at the
activity for the day and it's like oh my god it's like i got like i scrolled for like 20 minutes i'm
like only an hour in um to seeing like what actually
and you to find like real people who are actually might be putting bids in um but um yeah so now
I'm kind of like I like the problem like I believe in the provenance of is the best version doing it
this way and that momentum and kind of secondary, like you need to keep attention on these things.
And that's maybe different than being a traditional artist in a lot of ways where the work is like always listed.
It's always live. It's always right there.
It is quite a pivot from the art world of days past, for sure.
Good, bad or indifferent. you're definitely a part of
that i just gotta add this right now too i firmly believe that like we're at the lowest level of
collectors will ever be oh yes and interest so like the love basically saying like where am i
all my work that i've released is at value wise and the collectors who hold it you can go through
my deco 100 or look at the collection of my work. Like I see some collectors in this space right now.
Some really like,
I personally think I have the best collectors in the space.
The people I was talking about,
the people who are actually here for art
who actually really value my work.
I think it's important and special.
Get like a lot of meaning out of actually being
a Jake Fried collector.
And people who just have like insanely incredible
collections and very valuable ones. That's important to me that like my collector base
is really strong and gives me confidence that over the next decade, 20 years, whatever, that
smart, thoughtful, educated,
artistically literate collectors that come into the space will find my work
and will want to collect it.
And that makes me happy.
I want that to happen.
I've heard you mention in another space,
as far as like PFPs or things you think
will be important 20, 30 years from now,
there's probably very few, right?
But I think we know there's
CryptoPunks that have their provenance. There's Cryptoads, which I think are always going to be
somewhat culturally relevant, at least in our space. So where do you see 20 years from now,
besides yourself, what pieces do you hope to kind of see in the zeitgeist or in a museum or on a
wall somewhere? Yeah. I mean, I will say Cryptoads, big fan.
I only own one at the moment.
Hell yeah.
But ever since I saw, I kind of avoided the PFP space
and was pretty surprised, I have to say, in 2021
to see how much mine share it took.
And I always, there's sort of like a push and pull
between the PFP space and the art space.
And obviously they're intertwined in so many ways.
And I do think art is a collectible object.
And that we could call fine art a collectible can seem like it's devaluing it.
But it's in this space, there's clearly so much overlap that it almost is indistinguishable.
And like, again, if you look at people's vaults or wallets,
like I have the art I collected and my crypto and my like, you know,
X copy max pain in the same wall. And I see them as like part of my collection,
although they sort of hit different things.
And obviously they're great tools for onboarding and community engagement and
all that stuff. So I've come to terms with like that there's positives there,
but I've always thought they were generally like wildly overvalued,
like compared to some of the art in the space. And I still say this,
I mean, crypto punks obviously are in their sort of own domain.
I don't want to like, this is the one part where like,
I don't really want a crypto punk.
I feel like am I the only person in the spaces like that?
I don't know.
I totally understand their importance and relevance.
To me, they seem like their identity markers and use good for like sort of like they serve a purpose that I don't need.
And I don't really collect to sell.
And it would be such an expensive thing to buy that i would always think about selling it
something kind of that came with meme coins which i dabbled in here and there but it's sort of like
i'm only buying this thing to sell it later and i don't like the way that feels like i like
collecting stuff and just like that's i want to have that maybe i'll sell it at some point down
the road but generally if it's something that i could sell then i always get in this mind of like
what can i sell at the right time when should i sell it should i sell it should i hold it
i just hate that feeling so um the art go to my vault i mean i i think there's a link to it
through my links thank god open c open c again good or bad like i know that's where most people
go to look at stuff and i've had my galleries on gallery.so and Deca.
And I just saw it through like stats.
Like most people click through to my vault if I share the OpenSea link.
So my vault,
you can see the artists that I collected from that I think are,
I try to collect from at least something from every artist that I think is
really important. And I share them on the timeline.
But generally I'm looking for like auteurs, you know, people with a really unique, strong
aesthetic identity. And just people, I think, generally, it's like one of those things where,
and I've seen this with my students too, there are, again, a lot of talented artists, a lot of
really hardworking artists, a lot of artists I would love to collect from if I had unlimited funds.
But generally, I try to think everything I collect has to be generally very special to me, almost like I really want to have that.
And almost like it reflects who I am and something I think is a serious flex.
I think is a serious flex.
And artists that I, like I'm trying to say,
that just have like a serious gift
that is beyond talent or technique,
that they're just like a really unique voice
that just makes work that speaks to me.
And I have, I do think with art,
which I find is very cool,
quality of visual art is that you can read it so
quickly and that I generally know if I like something right away,
why I like it or what is it I'm even getting from it can take a long time.
Sometimes it takes, I think, years for me to be like, that's, you know,
and we're sometimes just having the right conversation with someone about it or seeing it at the right time.
But I generally know what I like.
And generally the work that I've collected and artists that I've collected from, it's work where like I see it right away and I'm just like, I get so excited.
That's the way it feels to me to see art that really inspires me that I think is good.
the way it feels to me to see art that I'm really inspires me that I think is good is that in
yeah I don't know if I I this is why I like it when people say this about my work too that
it makes me want to go make art um and I can just think of an example like TJO
did is doing this diaries project um which I'm really glad I bought last year, I think is when I
bought it, where he's adding all these short films and videos and building this whole thing.
But like he shared with me some of the films he was working on.
And I was just like, God damn it.
This is so good.
Like, I'm jealous.
I'm like motivated to do better.
Like, I think highly of myself in my work. So like when I see work where I'm just like'm like motivated to do better like I think highly of myself
in my work so like when I see work where I'm just like oh my god that's when I
know that someone's like really doing something special for me so yeah go
through my vault and check out who I've collected from and go collect from them
I don't know if that was your question. What I want to see in museums, my work, hopefully.
And yeah, what I'm saying is like really important, like unique artists.
I think that is something that has been kind of interesting to watch evolve.
But I got like I've talked to so many marketplaces, projects, groups, dows, funds, auction houses, blah, blah, blah in the space.
But like ultimately what's going to last and what are the most valuable properties
in the space are these unique artists. Think of them as brands that are going to be the things that are remembered long term
and in the long run are going to be kind of like the only things that are around long term.
And so, yeah, I could very well see a gallery like, you know, should have like my work,
My work, PJO, Summer Wagner, Carborn, Omenta Jovum, I think Cider is quickly becoming a really important voice in this space.
Collected some work that I really love by him.
XCopy, I think for sure.
XCopy maybe more than any other artist sort of blends the collectible, investable token versus refined art.
But I don't want to scroll through my thing and call out all these names right now, but go look through it.
And yeah, I'm 100.
This is how confident I am. I worked in museums.
I've been a working artist for my life. I've been in this space.
I still follow what's going on in the experimental animation community and kind of digital art
outside the space. I see what's happening in museums and like there's no doubt that like a
lot of what's happening here is historically important and high level work. So, like, it has to be in museums.
Are your students at all interested in the NFT space?
Yeah, of course.
I've talked about this before, but the big thing with this,
I want my students to focus on their schoolwork.
I think being an independent artist,
I think you guys know this from closing the show
and being this yourselves,
but it's very difficult.
And to be a student in college,
being like, I'm just going to mint some stuff on Tezos
and see what happens, sell it, some additions.
Like, okay, you do that, but then what?
It's not just
a thing you just like do for fun it's like how what role does it play in your career where are
you going what are your plans what are you trying to build um and there are some entrepreneurial
students you know who are graduating being like nfts are a great way to yeah raise some funds to
maybe buy equipment or develop a project.
So in that way, it can be sort of like a Kickstarter type thing.
And it's a great way to like build communities and discover new art and be involved with it.
But if you want to be like me, you know, seeing the way I'm releasing work and all that sort of like you need a whole like career behind it.
And like it's not just like
you can be an edit you know sell an opt-ins and that's what being an artist is if that makes any
sense so for for most of them i would say like there's you got all the time in the world to like
drop your genesis piece or whatever or you know and it's been a lot easier obviously the last few
years like those students don't expect to make a ton of money, where maybe when it first started, it really did feel like you could mint something and just maybe possibly sell it for, you know, an ETH.
And, like, that's a lot of money for a college student.
Generally, what I found with onboarding or, like, people are not in the space who want to be in the space, that it was obviously easier, again, when it seemed like the hype was really strong.
obviously easier again when it seemed like the hype was really strong and that the you just see
like they're like not is it dead but like the less activity it has or the less it's on their radar
the less they feel they've been enticed to try it i think that's like super stupid i honestly
if if you're a digital animator independent digital artist and you're not exploring the
space like what the fuck are you doing to me it's a sign of your character that you're like actually not
ambitious enough to like make new pathways and change the art world
and like because it's like it's the artists that are going to lead the way um and if you want to
wait until it's all safe that's what i was saying to you before is like we're going to look back
you think this is the bear or like it's everything's fucked up it's like safe. That's what I was saying to you before. It's like, we're going to look back. You think this is the bear or like everything's fucked up.
It's like, you're going to look back and miss this.
This is like the wild days where it was cool.
And when it becomes all institutionalized,
I've gotten so many emails from,
what's the, you know, trad galleries
who are like, want to do NFT stuff.
And so they just reached out to artists
who've already been successful here.
It's like, no, you got it.
Like, we don't need you. They're like, no, you got it. We don't need you.
They're like, what value are you gonna bring to this?
But I think a lot of artists who are waiting
for it to be like institutionalized,
by the time that happens,
and it will be the thing that everyone just does anyways,
and it won't be, it's a unique kind of fertile ground
that it is right now.
It will be what the art world generally looks like now.
And we're seeing this, you know, we've all seen this space sort of transform to like
a more gallery system where artists are dropping like shows and not just random additions whenever
they feel like it.
It's becoming more, at least for artists who have like made a full time career here,
more of like the way we see traditional artists sort of behaving in a lot of ways.
So, yeah. So with students, I will say this,
most of my students don't want to be independent artists.
Like that is not, what does that even mean? Right. Right.
And saying that my whole life too, it's like,
I want to be an artist my whole life. I was an artist, but it's like, there's no way to what does that mean?
And for me, it's like it starts with the work and then you find ways to support yourself and hopefully get your art out there, respected, seen, celebrated.
and you find ways to get rewarded for that
And you find ways to get rewarded for that so you can make more of it.
so you can make more of it.
So my work led me to teaching and doing concerts and TV
and sort of internet video, native art.
But my students as a young emerging artist
shouldn't know exactly where they're going to land yet.
So for me, I'm always like with you guys, it's like, start with the work and let it find its way into the world, like, and share it as much as possible.
Find where it belongs.
Like the world's going to kind of tell you where to go, but it has to start with the work.
If you're, it's like, I want to have a TV show or I want to be a rich,
famous NFT artist. It's like, great, whatever. It doesn't matter.
Go make the work. Um, if that makes sense.
And one of my favorite little tidbits from interviews I've heard you do,
how thick is your final drawing when you finish one of these year long pieces?
Yeah, they're really big. They get compressed up and down and they scrape away but um they're generally like half an inch to an inch thick and
you can think about that with like it's just white out and ink on a piece of paper um and only
recently uh i sold the original piece of paper that the animation was made on with Brainwave to Vincent Van Doe.
Wow.
He has that in his home now hanging up framed.
And I've exhibited them a few times in galleries with the videos.
But yeah, and you can find it.
There's some kind of behind the scenes videos of my work out there.
You can kind of see what it looks like.
But I do have to remind people that the work is hand drawn and then when you see it physically
and you see my process in real life it's like it really hits home like holy shit he's drawing these
little tiny dots on this piece of paper i think that's the most fascinating part of your work is
that again it only exists digitally.
Like once you scan a frame in,
you're painting over that or drawing over that.
So like it doesn't exist anymore or it does,
but it's buried by layers and layers of other things.
Yeah.
It's so deep.
We didn't really get into that aspect at all,
but that is also really kind of an important part for me is that like,
I'm not just making art every day.
I'm destroying what I did before.
And,
uh, that to me relates again to like, me is that like i'm not just making art every day i'm destroying what i did before and uh
that to me relates again to like gorgeous meditation or like you know the impermanence of
a moment and of expression and creativity and which again makes me i completely can wrap my head around digital art objects being as valuable as
physical ones because that's the way I've always I've always thought of the physical object as
sort of like don't fetishize the object like who cares it's about the images that I get out of the
process and at the end of the day it's like it's not the piece of paper that's valuable it's like
the history it went through with me to make this thing and
that's important for me because i started as a painter and a lot of painting is
sort of fetishizing the the object sculpture clearly is and by that i mean just sort of like
crafting this gem this thing you know what I mean?
Yeah.
Being really precious about it.
And for me, like that can be, I think it's a bit,
it's a bit debilitating or slows me down creatively.
So like talking about play, it's so clearly play.
Cause I'll just destroy what I'm doing. Right.
It's like a kid playing with Legos and like,
you build this really cool thing. You're not you can build something tomorrow yeah like that does for me
it's like the truish versus building something with legos and then being i mean this is something
people do with legos and then being like i built it it's perfect now it sits on my shelf for five
years it's like that's what legos are for um it's true it's very true
it's true it's very true
so yeah that's my questions like I said I hate to
hate to keep you for too much longer because we've already probably double our
our length in this space just because I have so many questions but I appreciate you taking the time
and I could listen to 10 hours of you talking so please do more interviews
yeah thank you guys so much for having me. It's always so nice to have long form conversations in this space and Kips to like get to know you better.
This chat is great.
And David to kind of meet for the first time and get closer is awesome.
And like I said, that's what's great about the space.
Now we're friends forever.
And I hopefully will be able to meet up.
And I don't know if either of you are going to NFT NYC,
but I'm planning to be in town for that and hope to see some friends there.
But,
and yeah,
now that the kid is a little second kid is a little older.
I hope to do more traveling in general.
Cause that's one of the best parts of being in this community is getting to
see everyone in real life.
Hell yeah.
Thank you for having me.
I appreciate it, man. I really appreciate you taking the time and loved getting to hear everyone in real life. Hell yeah. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it, man.
I really appreciate you taking the time and loved getting to hear more of your story.
And like I said, can't get enough of it.
So I think the more you share, the more fascinated I become by the process and your life and
how you kind of go about your days, having to teach and also create and raise a couple
of kids on the side is a fun side project.
So just keep it up.
You bring me joy every single day when I see you share stuff.
So I appreciate you continuing to share stuff for the past many years.
I actually love doing interviews and talks.
So spread the word.
If you know anybody who's looking for someone, I'm always happy to do it.
Don't have anything specifically to show at the moment.
So I know that's what a lot of different spaces can be about,
but yeah,
always love good conversations and appreciate what you guys are doing.
You've got,
it sounds like a really deep history of conversations now that will be
recorded forever,
which is really important and special.
That is awesome.
It's actually 120 Kips.
I wrote the invite wrong this week and i just
went with it well that's pretty cool even better look at us i've always actually wanted to do
a more like regular sort of interview show that i could talk to people it's just been so hard
with everything else i have going on in life um And I know it takes so much work on its own. I wouldn't want to half-ass it, but that is something I aspire to as well.
Being a teacher is so meaningful for me and such an important part of my practice
that if I can find a way to bring that part of my life into Web3,
and I have done a lot of mentoring.
That's one of the reasons I was at the gallery in New York last month.
And I just, I really get a lot of mentoring. That's one of the reasons I was at the gallery in New York last month. And,
I just,
I really take a,
get a lot of value out of it.
yeah,
if you ever need,
find someone who needs someone to talk or,
or help out,
like keep me in mind and you can go to my website and read more about me and
different essays and interviews there.
but yeah,
I got to go now,
but thank you guys so much.
I appreciate it. Of course. Thank you again, Jake.
This was a blast and we'll definitely have you back. And yeah,
if you ever want to co-host co-host any spaces,
I know we're more than down to do it and yeah,
let's just keep trucking forward. Hell yeah. And, uh, yeah,
we'll be back next week, 2 PM Eastern time. We've got Christopher Shin.
And then, uh, and then the week after that, we've got a new-to-me artist, 009.
And he looks really cool.
He just started following us.
I saw his art right away, and I was like, this looks incredible.
And so I emailed him, and he was down.
And we're just going to keep trucking.
So it'll be a lot of fun.
Christopher, I'm really interested to talk to that guy.
He sounds super.
Yeah.
For like the fifth time we need to get a life.
Oh, I love you, Chris.
But both great artists.
I hope I can attend.
Yeah.
It's always, it's always fun.
Chris and I have a good, good laugh.
It's good times.
It'll be great.
Well, thank you again, Jake and everyone.
Give Jake a follow.
Give me and Kips a follow.
Keep up, keep showing up to these spaces. Keep making art and. Give me and Kips a follow. Keep up.
Keep showing up to these spaces.
Keep making art.
And we'll do the same.
Talk with you all soon.
Bye.
