A fan-adored portrait of the late XXXTentacion is being released as an NFT.
The portrait—which was shared to X’s Instagram in 2018 and has since garnered more than 24 million likes—was taken by Queens-born photographer Aimos, who has now linked up with the Blockparty marketplace team for a collection of concert photography featuring X. The project, titled Now Crediting: Aimos, features the photo in question that broke records on Instagram and—per a press release—still receives constant comments even three years after first being shared.
For Aimos, the NFT project is an opportunity to promote the importance of proper crediting, as he never received credit for the wildly popular photo.
“NFTs are a very exciting new medium for photographers,” Aimos said. “We now can create additional resources for young photographers and for those who aren’t as well-informed, and moving forward, we’re creating a system to give artists more opportunities. The end goal would be for photographers to be able to handle their business and to not be afraid of the threat of copyright or credit. NFTs solve this issue, and I’m thrilled to start this off by releasing my work on Blockparty.”
The #NowCrediting initiative, a partnership between Aimos and Street Dreams, focuses on creating a “more digitally empathetic” system for artists while also encouraging fans and others to properly credit creators.
Now Crediting: Aimos will launch as a 24-hour auction on May 25 at 3 p.m. ET via Blockparty. A portion of sales from the auction will go toward the #HalfTheStory nonprofit, a global community that promotes an “unfiltered” approach on social media. The starting price for the NFT is $100,000.
While the controversy surrounding NFTs at large remains an ongoing concern, this doesn’t mark the first such project to be associated with the XXXTentacion name. Earlier this month, X’s estate unveiled an NFT auction focused on a collection of SoundCloud era tracks and previously unreleased tour footage.
