Holding lots of unwanted NFTs? nearly worthless or less good-looking NFTs? No idea what to do with them now? Well, why not roll the dice and sacrifice them in the Sea of Redemption and see what happens?
Sea of Redemption (SoR) is renowned artist Shezad Dawood’s first major foray into the NFT space following a collaboration with Zien, a Web3 art platform pioneering decentralised systems for collecting art as Expanded NFTs: digital artworks with an option on redeeming for physical counterpart artworks.
Drawing on the origins of life, oceanic ecosystems, deep time, evolution and mythic beginnings, as well as financial and ecological pyramid schemes, the cult of crypto, and the crash in the NFT market, this expanded NFT PFP (profile picture) project combines Dawood’s artistic vision with innovative crypto mechanisms. SoR is equal parts complex fantasy world and interactive game: ultimately it is a story of origin, sacrifice and redemption.
The Mermes
Sea of Redemption is populated by The Mermes, cellular slime molds that pre-date animal evolution by 1.4 billion years. These mostly-altruistic and amoeba-like neon-sea-creatures, who have seen empires rise and fall before the advent of humankind, have been watching our recent evolution and NFT mania from deep underwater and are now surfacing to help cleanse our degen sins. The Mermes hitch a ride into participants’ wallets on one of ten sea creatures—including Whales, Dolphins, Octopuses, Fish, and Plankton, among others—in an oceanic taxonomy that parallels the food chain of bitcoin holders.
The Mermes evolve as they move up the hierarchy from formless protozoa to anthropomorphic beings. Hand-drawn by Dawood, before being animated by Zien collaborator Gabriel Stones, these conceptually and aesthetically multifarious creatures are informed by Dawood’s wide-reaching influences and ideas, while also connecting to the key thematic of marine ecology in his practice.
How does SoR work?
The SoR’s main characters are 1009 Mermes, of which there are 979 Basic Mermes, 27 Special Mermes, and 3 Super Special Mermes.
Stage 1: The Redemption Wallet. Across the internet, calls are made to sacrifice NFTs by sending them to the Redemption Wallet buried deep in the midnight zone of the ocean.
More stages are to be revealed soon.
Dates & Charity : The Redemption Wallet opens Tuesday 7th February – Tuesday 21st February Allow list mint: Wednesday 22nd February, 2023 Public mint: Thursday 23rd February 2023
10% of proceeds are donated to ocean research and conservation charities via Shezad’s Leviathan nonprofit.
About the artist
Shezad Dawood (b. 1974, London, lives and works in London) works across the disciplines of painting, film, neon, sculpture, performance, virtual reality and other digital media to ask key questions of narrative, history and embodiment. Using the editing process as a method to explore both meanings and forms, his practice often involves collaboration and knowledge exchange, mapping across multiple audiences and communities to create richly layered artworks exploring architectures and ecologies.
Selected collections include Guggenheim; Arts Council Collection; Tate; UBS; LACMA, Los Angeles; National Gallery of Canada; Government Art Collection, UK; US Government Art Collection; The British Museum, London; Sharjah Art Foundation; Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Delhi; Rubin Museum of Art, New York; and Mathaf, Doha
About Zien
Zien is a Web3 platform enabling a new way to produce and collect contemporary art as Expanded NFTs: onchain art that can be redeemed for physical counterparts. What Zien calls art in the 2.5th-dimension. Through experimental collaboration with today’s foremost artists, Zien transforms how museum-grade art is accessed and collected by future-focused audiences. Head to @zienzienbot on Telegram and press Start to join. By joining the Zien bot on Telegram you will be notified when new drops go live, plus unlock access to groups and online/offline events. The Zien bot will signpost you to previous, live and forthcoming drops, while also helping you to mint and redeem Expanded NFTs.
