Arkive Hosts Its First Flash Acquisition Round at the Material Art Fair in Mexico City

MEXICO CITY (February 7, 2023) - Arkive, the world’s first distributed museum, announces today that it will host its first flash acquisition round at the Material Art Fair in Mexico City on February 8th at 4pm CT. With a mission to democratize the traditional museum curatorial processes, Arkive will host live interviews with gallerists at the Material Art Fair to learn more about the proposed artworks via Instagram Live so anyone can tune in. Arkive members will then have until February 9th at 12pm CT to vote on which work is acquired.

The Material Art Fair is hosted annually in Mexico City to celebrate contemporary art created by both Mexican and international artists. With an anticipated 12,000 visitors over the four days of the event, the fair hosts 57 exhibitors from 30 cities across 15 countries to exhibit both emerging and established artists alongside special exhibitions, talks, and performances. Arkive will be partnering with the Material Art Fair to introduce attendees to the future of decentralized art curation and collection-building.

“At Arkive, we want to make art curation accessible to anyone,” said Tom McLeod, Executive Director of Arkive. “We’re working side-by-side with the Material Art Fair team to open up our curatorial process and put the spotlight on the talented artists whose work is at the fair. By allowing people all over the world to participate in the acquisition process, we’re actively reshaping the curatorial process.”

In its first flash acquisition round, Arkive will be considering 7 works from 5 gallerists. Further details about the prospective works will be available on the Arkive Atrium on February 8th at 4pm CT. In tandem, Arkive will stream live video interviews with the gallerists at the fair at 4pm CT via Instagram Live, with the voting period opening at the end of the stream. Arkive members will have less than 24 hours to participate in the acquisition round as voting closes the following day at 12pm CT, when Arkive and the Material Art Fair unveil the community’s acquisition on Instagram Live.

As the world’s first distributed museum, Arkive offers an innovative and democratic way to curate and preserve art and cultural artifacts. To date, the Arkive community has acquired nine pieces, including its most recent acquisition, A Terminal Escape From The Place That Binds Us (2022) by Gala Porras-Kim and The Homebrew Computer Club Issues 1, 2, 4, 5, 6 (1975). The museum also leverages blockchain technology, providing transparency and security to the art and artifacts it acquires.

“Arkive is a fascinating way to reimagine art institutions. I’m delighted that Feria Material can offer Arkive a useful platform to help this new, decentralized museum internationalize its collection of contemporary art,” said Brett William Schultz, Partner, co-founder, and General Director of Material.

This announcement arrives on the heels of Arkive’s recent launch of its second collection, “Making the Invisible Visible,” which the selected artwork will be joining. The items acquired for this collection will follow its theme of transparency, a core characteristic of Web3 technology.

About Arkive

Arkive is the world’s first distributed museum curated by the people. Arkive’s brand-new model of how a museum can operate gives the people the power to curate and select what items are culturally significant rather than institutions. With a collection shaped by alums from MoMA and Gagosian, Arkive was co-founded by Tom McLeod, a 5x founder who exited his last startup, Omni, to Coinbase. Prior to that, McLeod ran Pagelime (acquired by SurrealCMS in 2015), LolConnect (acquired by Tencent in 2012), and Imaginary Feet, which developed 15+ profitable iPhone apps enjoyed by over 10 million users.

For more information, visit arkive.net.

Contact Information

Brook Klingel

Media Contact

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