Metakovan, the person who bought the digital art or non-fungible token (NFT) created by artist Mike Winkelmann, known as Beeple, for $69.3 million in an auction conducted by auction house Christie's has identified himself as Vignesh Sundaresan.
Sundaresan, a blockchain entrepreneur based in Singapore, detailed his journey in a blogpost titled 'NFTs: The First 5000 Beeples How two immigrants from Tamil Nadu bought a piece of digital art for $69M. And what we're funding next.'
The blog also told the story of 'Twobadour', or Anand Venkateswaran, the steward of Metapurse, a crypto-based fund financed by Metakovan.
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'Everydays - The First 5000 Days, the digital art by Beeple, was sold on March 11 for a staggering $69 million. Sundaresan said he wanted to show "Indians and people of color that they too could be patrons, that crypto was an equalizing power between the West and the Rest, and that the global south was rising".
Sundaresan is a Y-Combinator alumnus who co-founded BitAcces, which has deployed over 1,605 bitcoin ATMs all over the globe. He is currently CEO of software technology provider Portkey Technologies. He is also the founder of Lendroid Foundation, which creates financial protocols exclusive to blockchain.
In the blog, Sundaresan also announced a $5,00,000 Metapurse fellowship for crypto storytellers. In the first edition, the fund will offer $1,00,000 to five writers, producers and content makers spread across 12 monthly stipends.
Describing Metapurse, the blog said, "Metapurse is a crypto-exclusive fund that specializes in identifying early-stage projects across blockchain infrastructure, finance, art, unique collectibles, and virtual estate. The thesis of Metapurse is that the art of the Metaverse will be crucial, beautiful, digital, and cryptographical. And it will be stored on-chain."
On NFT art, it said digital decentralisation enables cultural decentralisation. "Anyone can create NFT art, anyone can buy it, anyone can see it, and anyone can be inspired by it. Dominant cultures have a tendency to imperialize, to centralize. We see the global Metaverse as an antidote to this tendency."
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