An NFT Gallery Pops Up in Venice Beach, California

Look what's popping up: A pop-up NFT gallery.

Venice Beach, in Los Angeles, has long been a mecca for artists and performers, many of whom perform on its equally famous boardwalk. Nestled among its shops and venues, the pop-up Bright Moments NFT gallery, featuring a room full of non-fungible tokens displayed on video screens, is set to open its doors to the public tomorrow.

Seth Goldstein, a Los Angeles-based NFT artist and investor, and Louie Ryan, a coffee shop proprietor, are the entrepreneurs behind the gallery. Their big idea: the installation will be a prototype for a “gallery DAO” that would build a tokenized network of similar sites around the world.

“The goal is to build a leaderless gallery system,” Goldstein told Decrypt. If the idea works, he added, “we can expand the network to galleries anywhere." 

Bringing NFTs to the general public through art exhibitions

The installation, located next door to the historic Townhouse saloon and speakeasy just outside the entrance to Venice beach, plans to feature CryptoKitties, CryptoPunks, NBA Top Shot highlights and other NFTs. 

The pop-up gallery includes several large LCD screens; a QR code is overlaid on each NFT so visitors can scan it with their phones to learn about the piece and see the creator’s other works. Potential buyers interested in one of the pieces will need to authorize their ether wallets to make bids.

"The concept is an empty space with physical displays," Goldstein said. "The idea is that guests walk into the gallery and the displays could be showing anything from crypto art or anything found on SuperRare or Rarible," Goldstein said the gallery plans to show a variety of NFTs from various genres. 

"There is a proliferation of content that is free and available, most of the time people are looking at it online in their own metaverse alone," Goldstein said. "What we're saying is rather than doing that on your phone or desktop, do it together with people as we're coming out of the pandemic, we can do it together as people instead of alone."

Bringing the Venice counter-culture to the DeFi revolution

The NFT craze continues unabated; artists, creators, and entrepreneurs are looking for more ways to bring this new art form to the masses. An increasing number of celebrities, from Paris Hilton to Snoop Dogg, have jumped on the bandwagon. NFTs are mainly seen, bought, and sold online through websites such as Rarible or Opensea. 

So it makes sense that Venice, with its long history as a home of artists, musicians, and counter-culture, would give southern California a taste of Web 3.0. "The dynamic exists here between the art, the tech, the working class, the surfers, there is a beautiful dichotomy here," said Goldstein’s partner, Ryan, who owns the nearby Townhouse bar and Menotti's coffee shop.

Enter the DAO

Goldstein said the Bright Moments DAO would include a mix of artists, developers, NFT/DAO specialists, and organizers. First, revenue will come from NFT platforms that want to amplify and enable their creators and collectors to connect IRL at Bright Moments for dedicated exhibitions.

The token used by Bright Moments is the BRT token, which will be distributed to the 40 founding members of the Bright Moments DAO. BRT tokens act as governance tokens for the DAO. Each founding member will get 25,000 tokens, with the remaining 9 million BRT distributed to future creators, collectors, and gallery owners. 

Goldstein says each community member is chosen based upon the unique and complementary skills they can contribute to the DAO. To be selected to receive BRT Tokens, every community member will be contributing some combination of time/expertise/capital for their tokens. 

Goldstein anticipates the BRT token will be available on Uniswap. BRT tokens enable the members to join the Bright Moments discord and vote on DAO matters.

"The DAO will vote on how we generate revenue, and NFTs we acquire, get reinvested or distributed in the future," Goldstein said.

Plans for future NFT galleries include locations in New York, Miami, London, Berlin, Tokyo, Tel Aviv, Stockholm, Seoul, and Barcelona.

The Bright Moments NFT Gallery is located at 62 Windward Ave in Venice, next to the world-famous Venice sign at the entrance to Venice Beach.

Editor's note: This story was updated to correct the street address of the NFT gallery.