-Jaxon Havens
As night fell on December 1st, 2022, neon lights and screen projections kept one Miami rooftop bright, as the “World Premiere NFT Film Viewing Party'' commenced atop The Lincoln Eatery. The event featured a pilot TV episode, crafted by Lucy Powers and Delilah Napier, entitled “Victor Versus the Metaverse.” The pilot, to which the New York Film & Music Foundation was the executive producer, was a comedy about digital art in which a duo of upcoming artists believe they are scammed with an NFT and venture to Art Basel’s show in Miami Beach to find the NFT’s originator. Their journey turns outlandish, as digital art and the “Metaverse” converge. Powers and Napier co-wrote, directed, and starred in the film, as well as delivered an address to attendees at the screening.
"Victor Versus the Metaverse" resulted from a chance encounter between Powers and Napier and an NFT start-up founder during Art Basel’s 2021 show in Miami. Starting from the broad prompt of creating a work involving NFTs, the duo’s end product interweaves live footage and interviews of the NFT community with a storyline starting in New York. In this way, the piece cemented its comedic plot within a world of reality, further putting the “meta” in “metaverse.”
In regards to the content of the film itself, the work excels in pacing and comedy in a fresh way. The quick-cutting of visuals during dialogue sequences is dynamic and the satirical poking at young Gen Z artists is cleverly done. Powers manages to make her character entertaining while still being more of the duo’s “straight man,” and Napier plays with more intense satire and absurdity in a way which is evocative of Rachel Sennott’s character in the 2022 hit Bodies, Bodies, Bodies. The work explores a hot topic of contemporary discussion, and while this exploration could take away from the focus of the plot, the duo’s goal of finding Victor anchors the storyline well. By the end of their trek to Art Basel and the accompanying yacht party and NFT art auction, they are made incredibly aware of both the benefits and drawbacks of the precarity of NFT art. In a sweet moment, having weathered great stress, the duo have the exchange:
NAPIER: “That’s the beauty of volatility in the art world. Tech art”
POWERS: “Tart.” [laughs]
Swiftly after, this natural dialogue is cut off with a text from Victor; an invitation for the duo to take action within the strange, colorful metaverse introduced from this pilot.
Touching on such a relevant emerging issue, “Victor Versus the Metaverse” leaves plenty of room for thinking. While the creation of NFT art and the overall increasing digitization of the art world have been quite controversial, Powers and Napier’s film stands as a unique creation which comments on and engages with the digital art world itself. From here, the storyline could continue delving into questions of data colonialism, digitization as historical preservation, and issues of authenticity beyond “art fraud.” The pilot episode aptly demonstrates the importance of having young filmmakers who understand the cultural pulse of our current moment. That freshness is, perhaps, the greatest strength of this film.
Further, the screening party, enlivened by discussion and enriched by the milieu of lighting, refreshments, and cushioned seating, used digitally-grounded art to bring people together in-person. With great uncertainty surrounding the implications of digitization on the future of the art world—from music’s switch to streaming, to online theatre content made more available since the COVID-19 pandemic, to NFTs generated from artwork minted on blockchains—the power of artists like Powers and Napier to use “the digital” as a source of inspiration may signal that technology is not a demonic force encroaching upon art. Rather, it alters the cultural landscape and provides artists with novel opportunities to play and create. Artists are increasingly in need of help to navigate the new landscape, in its many opportunities and challenges, but one thing is undeniable: the power of creative expression is alive and well.
