Skip to main content

The Manual may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site.

These Artists Are Inviting You to Engage in Their NFT Art

“I often say words and lines are the same thing. Words are made up of lines. And my lines, like words, make conversations. They help me to connect with the world. They help me to collaborate. They help me to discover myself.”

Shantell Martin has a way of talking about her art that creates its own aesthetic. This personal chat, The Importance of Conversation, is part of a piece of an NFT that collectively is its own article of art. Sold for $1,300 on Nifty, the visual and audio one-off collectible followed a team-up with

Kendrick Lamar

in Amex Music Meets Art in Miami with her debut collection, The Importance of Conversation. Fellow artist Ben Sheppee brought Martin’s black and white drawings into animated NFTs. They come to life to ask thought-provoking questions like “Does progress really exist or is it the scenery that changes?” and dropping dimes like “Knowing is Growing.”

Shantell Martin posing with her art in the background.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Martin presents her vulnerability by directly addressing her audience in the video conversation. The line artist describes how she wields words as tools to converse and gain access to a greater personal understanding through the self-exploration and visual communication that unlocks growth.

Recommended Videos

“They help me to get to know things about the world and things about myself that I don’t think I would ever get to know in any other way. Conversations with ourselves are so vital and so important.”

Available in sets of 20 at

Nifty Gateway

, The Importance of Conversation isn’t the only project that Martin has been involved in this year. Her black and white work is also featured in a collaboration with digital artist Jon Burgerman in

A Better Place

from the collection Let’s Draw Together. Burgerman’s bright faces and bouncing balloon-edged creatures accompany Martin’s encouraging words.

“One day we can. One day we will. Today we may make this planet a better place. Some day.”

Shantell Martin on a ladder holding a pen to draw her art at NYC Ballet.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Related Guides

Burgerman also animates his digital art, using technology to create weird playful worlds, which include his new project, Jon’s Pizza Shop.

The shop mimics a real-life American Italian eatery with customizable pizza slice NFTs on order with available toppings like pepperoni and cheese. Users can also combine their slices to create whole pies. Burgerman is even giving away to a lucky few users 23 hand-painted physical works. To the English artist living in New York City, the idea of pizza, a food everyone loves and shares, is the ideal medium artistically.

A portrait of Jon Burgerman placed side-by-side with a pizza slice from Jon's Pizza Shop.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

“I’ve always had a fondness for pizza,” Burgerman writes on his website. “Growing up in the U.K. in the 80s and 90s, pizza was a rare treat offered up by my exhausted parents. When I moved to live in New York, at the end of 2010, I truly fell in love with pizza.”

There are seemingly a million ways to customize a pie. In Jon’s Pizza Shop, Burgerman generated a total purchasable amount of 6,666 unique NFTs, all drawn on his iPad Pro, to bring together endless combinations of lively, almost mischievous pizza slices kicking up their crusty heels.

“Pizza, the most otherworldly yet down to earth mood enhancer, is so simple; bread, cheese, tomato … and yet, so complex and so versatile,” Burgerman continues.

Opening this month, Jon’s Pizza Shop NFTs will be available in the Moonverse NFT marketplace on the Solana blockchain.

Jon’s Pizza Shop

 NFTs will be tradable during the first 24 hours with each exclusive and distinct addition appearing in very limited quantities.

Topics
Matthew Denis
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Matt Denis is an on-the-go remote multimedia reporter, exploring arts, culture, and the existential in the Pacific Northwest…
Former Disney CEO Bob Iger Leaps Into the Genies Metaverse
Bob Iger as a Genies avatar.

Business executive Bob Iger is going from managing Mickey Mouse to overseeing New Age djinns.

On March 14, Genies, a leading avatar technology company, announced that the former Disney Chairman and CEO joined its board of directors. This includes a personal investment in the 2017 startup. For Iger this is a further step into animation, following a new direction away from traditional global powerhouses to enabling consumers to create their own worlds. For Genies, this means adding a big name and a sharp brain to its board.

Read more
Own a Part of Nick Kyrgios NFT of his Australian Open Win
Kyrgios playing at the 2021 Australian Open.

Australian tennis star Nick Kyrgios entered the Australian Open men’s doubles draw as a wildcard with fellow Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis. After each man made an early exit in the singles tournament, the pair applied themselves to the double draw and surprised everyone with an unprecedented run all the way to the championship.

Now, the NFT trading website sweet.io has released a super-limited set of Nick Kyrgios NFTs available for tennis fans and sports collectors alike. As of February 1, the NFTs offer the opportunity to experience and to own a personal piece of the incredible doubles victory with the launch of six super-limited NFTs. Each non-fungible token is available for $399 and grants buyers one of 22 exclusive clips of Kyrgios at the 2022 Australian Open.

Read more
A Real-Life Spiderman Panel Sells For a Record $3.4 Million
Venom's first appearance in Spider-Man in 1984.

With NFT’s making all the news lately, physical art showed it still has clout this past week, especially when it comes to comics.

A 1984 Spider-Man comic book page sold at auction for $3.36 million on Thursday, January 13, a record sale for any inside comic book work. The Mike Zeck-drawn art is from Marvel Comics’ “Secret Wars No. 8” — the first introduction of Spidey’s symbiote black suit, which would eventually lead to the emergence of Venom. The record bidding started at $330,000 and quickly soared past $3 million in a vicious (and expensive) bidding war during Heritage Auctions’ four-day comic event in Dallas.

Read more