Blockchain racks up a new use case: selling high-end Art

International auctioneers Christie’s says Blockchain was key to a very successful night – including including for the most expensive work of pre-war American art with Edward Hopper’s Chop Suey, which sold for $92m.

Specifically, the event last week in New York marked the first time an art auction at this price level has been recorded on a Blockchain, via a secure digital registry administered by Artory, an “art-centric” technology provider, with the vendor enabling hosting of auction information by its permission Blockchain solution.

Hailed as the greatest privately-owned collection of American Modernist art ever to come to market , including works by artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper and Jackson Pollock, the collection – that of private collector Barney A Ebsworth – was sold by the firm last week in a session setting multiple new world auction records, with participants from 23 countries bidding.

Some 42 art pieces were auctioned off, with a private Ethereum Blockchain recording the details of each sale, as Artory’s software stored all significant information from as sales, final prices, auction dates, item titles, restorations and thefts. The only information not stored is the identity of owners, which ensures that the privacy of art collectors and investors is strictly respected, claims the firm.

The good news for a buyer is they thus have a secure and unchangeable digital record of the history artwork they are buying, reducing the danger of buying a fake.

And as a new digital certificate is generated each time a work is sold on,  buyer assurance is strengthened while Christie’s can be assured only original artworks are auctioned.