How artists, cryptocurrency exchanges are using NFT sales to fund gender equality campaigns

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Artists and cryptocurrency exchanges donate proceeds from NFT sales to charitable causes to help eliminate gender inequality and reduce the wealth gap

Blockchain has lowered the entry barrier for creators to make a living, with art sales via NFTs totalling US$324 million in the first half of the year, report says.

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A visitor looks at NFT digital artworks at the Millon Belgique auction house, in Brussels on May 18, 2021. Photo: AFP

Georgina Lee

Published: 1:30pm, 27 Dec 2021

A growing number of artists and cryptocurrency exchanges are riding the popularity of non fungible tokens (NFTs) to launch blockchain-based fundraising campaigns for philanthropic causes.

The buzz surrounding non fungible tokens has helped artists such as Mike Winkelmann, a digital artist better known as Beeple, fetch a record US$69 million for NFT artwork at Christies’ online auction in March. Rapper Snoop Dogg also auctioned his NFT Decentral Eyes Dogg, featuring his new audio track and artwork, at Art Basel Miami this month.

But wealth creation aside, some artists are using NFTs to help plug the wealth gap in other parts of the world, or to campaign for gender equality.

Pakistani artist Maliha Abidi last month launched her Women Rise project to mint 10,000 NFTs, donating part of the proceeds from the sale to advocacy groups supporting equal rights for women, such as the Malala Fund, an NGO co-founded by activist Malala Yousafzai to support girls’ education. Each NFT features a hand-drawn portrait of women of different nationalities and traits.

The Women Rise NFT project by Pakistani artist Maliha Abidi. Photo: Handout

NFTs are blockchain-based tokens that represent collectibles, art pieces and other creative works whose designs are one of a kind, and therefore non-fungible.

“We want to start with increasing literacy of the internet and technology among women,” Abidi said during a call hosted by cryptocurrency exchange OKEX last week.

Abidi said the goal was to educate families about the “financial independence to be gained from participating in the internet and blockchain community”.

Blockchain will become the new normal for the web in future, according to Abidi, who worked as a traditional artist for nine years and is also studying neuroscience at the University of Sussex in the UK.

Blockchain and NFTs help connect artists directly with collectors because they eliminate the need for middlemen like galleries and art brokers. This means “there is a lot of money to be made” for artists and musicians, even if they do not have a university degree, Abidi said.