The NFT Universe captures the invisible web of SuperRare, one of the first and most prominent NFT platforms. Mapped for The New York Times Essay "The Art World Usually Works in Secret. Here's a Look Inside," by Barabasi, it shows each NFT sold on SuperRare between April 2018 and April 2021, linked to all NFTs once owned by the same collector. SuperRare Primary Market captures the emergence of the new art marketplace through the direct sale of the work by crypto artists to collectors. NFTs are special because all sales are publicly available, hence the NFT space offers the opportunity to track the actions of both artists and sellers. The artworks on the map are connected if they were ever owned by the same collectors. The colors highlight the collection of the top 20 collectors, showing the passion of multiple collectors for crypto-art, and the distributed nature of the primary sales.

The identity of the works and the collectors can be explored at the interactive page: http://nft.barabasilab.com/gexf-js/primary.htm



Credits: Albert-László Barabási, Kishore Vasan, Milán Janosov