Curio Cards is an early art project on the Ethereumblockchain, which became popular after renewed interests in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) in 2021. The project was created in 2017 to introduce digital art collecting to Ethereum, generate awareness of crypto and support artists through it.[1] The full set of Curio Cards consists of 30 cards, with artwork by seven different artists, as well as the misprint card "17b".[1] After being identified as the first art NFTs on Ethereum, a complete collection of Curio Cards was sold for ETH393 ($1,267,320) at the Christie'sPost-War to Present auction in October 2021.[2][3]
Background
Curio Cards was developed by Travis Uhrig, Thomas Hunt, and Rhett Creighton, and launched on May 9, 2017. At launch, they sold for $0.50–$1 each, which was paid to the artists.[2] Curio Cards feature multiple sets of 30 unique digital images by seven different artists.[2] Curio Cards are colloquially considered to be the first collection of NFT artworks on the Ethereum blockchain.[3][4][5][6] On October 1, 2021, a complete collection of Curio Cards, including the digital misprint "17b", was sold by an anonymous seller for $1.2 million at Christie'sPost-War to Present auction held in New York.[2][7] This was the first Christie's auction where bidding was conducted solely using Ethereum cryptocurrency.[2]