HOFA Gallery launches token in world first for fine art
ARTM token to go up for public sale via several exchanges
HOFA Gallery will become the world’s first fine-art gallery to launch a native token, with an initial dex offering (IDO) scheduled for 28 December, 3pm UTC.
The Artem coin (ARTM) is the brainchild of the gallery’s chief executive Elio D’Anna and director Simonida Pavicevic, who co-founded the gallery, with branches in London, Los Angeles and Mykonos, in 2012.
ARTM will support NFT curation by collectors and will be the standard currency on HOFA’s Kreation.io and HOFA.io NFT marketplaces.
The gallery, which seeks to bridge the gap between the digital and physical spaces, is no stranger to the crypto scene, having accepted most major cryptocurrencies as payment for its exclusive collection since 2018.
Public sale
ARTM is already available to strategic investors, while 20 million of the total supply will go up for public sale on the CardStarter and Infinity Pad decentralised exchanges with a starting price of $0.045.
The initial supply will be 9%, with a vesting schedule planned over two years to control circulation. D’Anna said that $6m was raised in private sales so far, and he expected the public sale to go within seconds.
Given the complexity of the project, does D’Anna have concerns about the token’s utility? “We’re using the best team on this project. We have market makers called Acheron who have worked on some of the biggest projects that have come out recently,” he said.
“We work with a specialised team that manages the functionality of the token as it’s distributed and vested.”
Other galleries enter NFT space
Plans are also in place to allow staking of ARTM tokens.
HOFA is not the only fine-art gallery to enter the NFT scene. In April 2020, the Berlin-based König Galerie launched its virtual space König Digital. But D’Anna said: “There are no other galleries that have their own token and have an on-chain NFT platform. That is a genuine claim.”
Asked if he thought others would follow HOFA if the project was a success, D’Anna said: “We are just working on our own thing and not thinking too much about what others are doing. We like to embrace anything that can help make the art space more accessible, and create more transparency in sales and confidence in the buyer of the artist.”
HOFA’s NFT exhibition Beyond the Heavens is running from 5 December to 10 January at its gallery in Mayfair, London.
