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CHRISTIE'S just sold a piece of art for $69.3 million that can only be seen on a blockchain on a computer.
A non-fungible token, or , created by digital artist Mike Winkelmann, commonly known as Beeple, sold for the record-breaking price on Thursday.
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The art, called "Everydays: The First 5000 Days," is an NFT, which is a series of unique files that live on a blockchain and verify the ownership of a work of digital art.
Winkelmann has only ever sold a print for $100 up until a few months ago, when he began selling NFTs for about $67,00 apiece in October.
He then sold a series of works for $3.5 million in December, and in February, one of the NFTs originally sold for $66,666.66 was resold at $6.6 million.
But this week's sale of his new digital artwork puts him "among the top three most valuable living artists," according to the .
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Buyers of NFTs get limited rights to display the artwork each NFT represents, which essentially means buyers are more so paying for bragging rights in attaining such a piece, and can resell that ownership later on.
Artwork created through this technology has seen a huge boom in recent years, with Winkelmann at the forefront of such artists.
"He showed us this collage, and that was my eureka moment when I knew this was going to be extremely important," Christie's specialist Noah Davis told . "It was just so monumental and so indicative of what NFTs can do."
"Holy f**k," Winkelmann after his art sold this morning.
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Winkelmann has a large cult following, with around 2.5 million followers across social channels.
There's also been a lot of hubbub around "Everydays," as it's Winkelmann's 14th year making art everyday.
"I do view this as the next chapter of art history," Winkelmann said. "Now there is a way to collect digital art."
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