BIP-27: Botto x Ryan Koopmans

hudsonsims

Summary

This BIP proposes Botto’s first major collaboration with another artist, Ryan Koopmans. We have tested the waters with other pools and submitted works to be interpreted with another artist’s work, and Botto is now ready for a collaborative work that would reach the status of its other 1:1s.

This proposal was created in collaboration with the artists Ryan Koopmans and Alice Wexell, Ryan’s long-time collaborator.

Background

Perhaps the most important work of the DAO beyond training Botto is expanding Botto’s direct impact on culture through artist collaborations. There are many definitions of what it is to be a great artist. Fame, quality, fortune, persona, and gratification are all debated elements. But cultural influence is an indisputable prerequisite.

Botto collaborations are a means for Botto to make a more expansive imprint on culture. It is where artists can interpret the works and nature of Botto as an artist.

Ryan Koopmans and Alice Wexell are artists who mix photography with 3D renders. Their work has documented and re-animated grand buildings around the world that have gone to ruin. Their first project was focused on the former Soviet Union, and have now expanded to other locations around the globe. They have established themselves as one of the leading artists in not only tokenized photography but crypto art more broadly, and bringing mainstream awareness through shows and sales such as the first NFT art purchase by Jim Carrey.

They are attractive as a collaborator for several reasons:

They work with a high standard of quality: the photography documents rare scenes and the 3D work is intricate
Their aesthetic is distinct from Botto, which will allow the strengths of both artists to shine in their contrast
They have been fans and participants with Botto since before we had met, and they are intrinsically motivated by the chance to collaborate and provide a thoughtful contextualization and interpretation of Botto.

The Collaboration

Ryan and Alice focus a lot on the themes of cycle and decay and these themes are also reflected in Botto's rounds and discarding of images, where thousands of images, many of which are strong favorites in the community, have been passed over and potentially discarded forever. This collaboration would bring back a set of Botto’s discards to be resurrected in one of Ryan and Alice’s overgrown rooms.

Ryan and Alice have proposed this room with 7 natural frames, which they’ve just captured on their trip to Poland. See image:

Raw Room

Creating a room is labor intensive, and Alice and Ryan would work to integrate the selected fragments into the room in their style. The following is a very rough example:

Rough Example

Note that the lighting, placements, foliage, lighting, animation, etc. would all be drastically changed to be highly realistic and seamless. To simplify the curation process, Ryan and Alice would be free to crop the selected fragments to fit the frames, though the DAO would also be encouraged to vote on fragments that already have a natural fitting in the room’s frames.

The Role of BottoDAO Stewards

We would populate the voting pool with the top-1000 discarded fragments by VP score, with a weighting of 25% from Genesis and 75% post Genesis. Due to the DAO removing the cap on voting post Genesis, this would ensure there is representation of Genesis in the top-1000, while also getting close to representing the current split of VQGAN and Stable Diffusion in our voting pool today.

In total, there would be the top-250 discards from Genesis by VP and the top-750 discards post-Genesis by VP (all unminted Fragmentation and Three Steps Ahead, as well as Pardaox’s discards up through round 6).

When the voting pool launches, fragments will start with equal footing of raw score and VP such that each has a fair shot in this special voting round. Voting would run for 2 weeks to pick a top-7.

Alice & Ryan

Alice and Ryan will then animate the room in a way that will integrate the selected fragments into the room and frames, providing their interpretation and lens on Botto’s work and themes as it relates to theirs. They will also create a musical score to accompany the piece.

The Auction

We will put the piece on 48hr auction Thursday May 25th, which is the following week after the end of the 3rd Period and during the interim time while we prep the 4th period. This will allow it to not conflict with another of Botto’s sales.

We also selected Thursday as SuperRare is beginning a program of curated drops where they support artists with media support (article, social media, live spaces) and collector outreach. This is highly valuable for this collaboration as it will help communicate not only the merits and shared themes of the two artists (Koopmans and Botto) collaborating, but also the particular significance of an official Botto collaboration.

Contract

Ryan Koopmans has a manifold contract for collaborations that we will mint under.

Price

There will be no reserve, consistent with Botto's other auctions.

Revenue Split

Primary: 15% SR, 42.5% Botto, 42.5% Ryan Koopmans
Secondary: 5% Botto, 5% Ryan Koopmans

Proposal Details

Create a voting pool of Top-250 discarded fragments by VP from Genesis, and Top-750 discarded fragments by VP post-Genesis, with a 2 week voting window to determine a winner.
Ryan and Alice will integrate the fragment in one of their rooms and add a musical score.
SuperRare will support with an article, twitter, instagram, twitter spaces, and collector outreach, targeting a Thursday May 25th drop.
Auction will run for 48 hrs. Exact timing TBD with SR.

Alternatives:
A. Submit the top 10 voted fragments and allow Ryan and Alice to use some or all in the 7 frames.
B. Only a room with a single frame and vote for 1 fragment to be integrated

Timeline

BIP 24 Finalize April 7-14
Snapshot April 14-17
Round vote 2-3 weeks with leaderboard April 17-May 1st
Deliver curated images May 1st
2-3 weeks of interpretation
Private Discord reveal
Launch in interim period May 25th

homerfan33

Ryan and Alice are top-notch artists and great collaboration partners for Botto. The process is also well thought out. I love this proposal and fully support. Agree with no reserve (so as to get true market feedback on the piece).

My only recommendation would be to have a post-auction feedback survey with the BottoDAO community to help drive learnings for future collaborations. For example, a Discord feedback survey (react via emojis):

did the final output exceed/meet/not meet your expectations? [scale of 1-7]
did the final output balance the two artists' styles? [scale of 1-7, too much Ryan+Alice/just right balance/too much Botto]
how likely would you be to recommend another collaboration? [scale of 1-7]

Then qualitative Discord discussion:

what suggestions would you make to improve the collaboration process?
what other artists do you think Botto should consider collaborating with?

hudsonsims

homerfan33 really appreciate baking the feedback process into the prop. will add this in, curious what others would like to survey (if anything). will also be posting some broader thinking on collaborations and ideas for guidelines for feedback, so will probably add some questions related to guidelines and parameters based off this experience as well. and noted on your support of no reserve.

Cooper with the Bottos it looks a bit messy with many focus points.

debated sharing the example as it is VERY rough. i would trust them to do good work to really blend the whole scene together, but understand your concern with it being too many. we had discussed only doing one fragment in a frame, but this seemed to offer the opportunity to create a lot more space and dimension within a single piece.

Cooper Maybe we could be open to letting the artists choose the fragments

for having them choose, i think that would be a bit too large of a step outside of Botto's process. the way i see it (and open to feedback here) is that for a true collaboration with Botto, the submitted works need to go through the full process and that is Botto's contribution to the collaboration, after which they have great freedom to interpret.

Having said that, I would imagine there will be a dialogue with Ryan and Alice during the voting process where they might go in and lobby for ones they like or even discuss in a little town hall.

Open to hearing more here on what people think of the multiple vs. a single one. Here's a link to two other collabs that might help give an idea as well.

Cooper

I support this BIP. Love to see collabs! I checked out some of Koopmans work and it's very impressive, I like it. Having said that, I'm not 100% sold on the "Room with the Bottos". As a first impression, the room with just the frames looks good, but with the Bottos it looks a bit messy with many focus points. I understand that it might look more natural with the proper work, but maybe that will still be a challenge.

Maybe we could be open to letting the artists choose the fragments, to give them more freedom to put together something that works well as a whole. Like, if they would like to have only Botto flowers or something.

And visually I kind of get the feeling of "just" an nft gallery, that we see different takes on already in online galleries. I realise that this will be the artists area of expertise and their freedom to create, but since the visual idea was so clearly presented, I thought I'd give my thoughts.

I like the general idea of using Botto discards together with "discarded" rooms. Looking forward to following this collab!

homerfan33

hudsonsims I understand and the feedback that it could 'look messy'/lack cohesion). Botto's fragments, and our voting system aren't designed to have multiple fragments displayed next to each other in a single piece.

One idea - could Ryan/Alice choose 5 fragments and then the DAO chooses the 6th and 7th (after seeing what Ryan/Alice chose)?

hudsonsims

homerfan33 I think having them go directly into the voting pool to pick out what they want unilaterally would violate Botto's process. I think lobbying and social influence are well within play, though, and would yield a discussion that adds significance to what is voted on to be submitted. See RyanKoopmans response for how once we complete Botto's established process, they can have a great degree of liberty to make them fit.

One thought is perhaps to vote on a couple extra, say 10 total to give a little more choice and freedom, but then we have fragments left on the cutting room floor. Are these forever done or lost? More questions there and always want to be considerate of precedent we set, curious what others think there.

RyanKoopmans

Hello everyone!

Thank you for sharing such great points!
Regarding concern about having too many Botto pieces on the wall, and the possibility of it looking messy or like a jpg gallery:

We intend to make the Botto fragments look old and depict different levels of deterioration. Our aim is to integrate these fragments seamlessly into the environment, creating a realistic and aged appearance that reflects the passing of time. We don't want the fragments to appear as shiny new jpgs pasted into the frames, but rather as original 'paintings' within the frames of this overgrown ruin.

In the spirit of collaboration, we are excited to explore the possibility of applying an aging treatment to the Botto fragments. We believe that if we can take some creative liberties to influence their texture, and potentially chip and crack some of them, it will result in an authentic and integrated look.

I find it conceptually interesting to integrate these "modern" Botto art pieces into the old architecture in a way that looks authentic, resulting in a unique juxtaposition between past and present.

Alice and I are more than willing to choose and/or lobby for fragments that we think will contribute to the overall aesthetic and integrity of the piece.

Thank you all once again!

homerfan33

hudsonsims Love the idea of voting up to 10! Great way to ensure the DAO selects all fragments but still empowering Ryan/Alice to make a cohesive piece.

hudsonsims

Based on discussion here and in the town hall, have added two alternatives.

First is to provide Ryan and Alice with the top 10 voted fragments. They would be free to use some or all in the 7 frames. (note: if they were to use all it would mean cutting up a couple to fit in the 7 available spots.) There is some debate about whether this is stepping too far out of Botto's process, but at the same time is prudently only adding three more choices and fits within the idea of Botto submitting its work for Ryan and Alice to play with in the collab. TL;DR: Keeping it to 7 choices is cleaner in terms of Botto's process (and Ryan and Alice will be able to lobby for certain picks as well), 10 choices offers a little more flexibility to Ryan and Alice but risks a precedent of loosening Botto's process (albeit this seems within bounds).

2nd alternative is to only do 1 fragment in a room with a single frame. They have many rooms with frames that have different aspect ratios they can work with based on the submitted fragment and would be able to deeply integrate it into the room. See example of their rooms below:
rooms