NFTs in M’sia this week: Ipoh teacher opens NFT exhibit for art by special needs kids

Last week, we wrote about an NFT exhibition in Kuching, Sarawak, highlighted an upcoming festival in KL, and teased that we had minted our own NFT.

Well, here’s the story and…

The successful sale of our NFT

Being total noobs, we had to start with the basics, which was opening a MetaMask wallet. That was simple enough, and in between figuring that out, we also had to think about what our NFT would actually be about.

Eventually, we settled on going for something nostalgic and meaningful: the cover image on our Vulcan Post Malaysia Facebook page.

It’s something we took years ago and have kept to this day, and it’s what greets our audience every time they visit our page.

Plus, there’s an old LG phone model, the V20 specifically, in the picture, which makes it all the more precious since LG’s global mobile division officially stopped production of all mobile devices in 2021. In a way, we’ve preserved a piece of history.

With our NFT decided on, we headed to Malaysian NFT marketplace, Pentas.io, and proceeded to mint it. Turns out, minting an NFT isn’t too hard at all, and the main things to think about are:

Admittedly, since we only minted one NFT and didn’t actually expect someone to buy it, we didn’t think of a roadmap or added benefits for the collector. We simply priced it at 0.02 BNB and set our royalty to 8%.

Regardless though, it seemed that the lack of those didn’t bother one buyer, who bought it and is now attempting to sell it for 100 BNB (RM176,511.76 at the time of writing).

We have no idea who you are, but we’re flattered, and also very curious about why you bought it. Hopefully we’ll get to speak to you one day.

Someone we did speak to recently though was…

MyeongDong Topokki’s CEO on the launch of their NFT restaurant

Vincent Lua told us that he believes they can leverage NFTs and the metaverse as ways of staying relevant to social trends and expanding the brand’s bandwidth.

Their NFTs are designed in-house based on their mascot, Pokki, and 970 variations of it are available on OpenSea. All but one have a floor price of 0.08 ETH.

They are split into four tiers, all of which offer different perks to be enjoyed at MyeongDong Topokki’s Genting outlet, dubbed their first NFT restaurant.

Read more about the experiences the restaurant offers here.

NFT exhibition for art by special needs children

ZenShin Agency & Creative Studio and Shiroprint Malaysia have joined hands to start an online store called Lonely Planet.

Described as the “inner world of a group of disabled children”, Lonely Planet is an avenue where they can express themselves through creative art.

It’s part of Eric Lai’s passion project. He’s a mural artist from Ipoh, Perak, and is now also an art teacher who helps draw the artistic talents of special needs kids.

Apart from selling jigsaw puzzles, apparel, and canvasses of the kids’ art, Lonely Planet has also opened an NFT art exhibition to showcase the art to the wider public.

The exhibition is currently ongoing from now until April 24, 2022, at GMBB. For one price, both the original painting and its NFT can be purchased.

Otherwise, you can head to Lonely Planet’s OpenSea account to purchase the NFT and get the original painting delivered to you later, with shipping costs handled by yourself.

Each NFT listing comes with its own story about the artist behind it, which is a sweet added touch, considering how the goal is to increase exposure for the children.

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Through the grapevine, we’ve heard that there’s a new local NFT restaurant, so we’re looking to score an interview with them and learn what their long-term plan is for incorporating Web3 technology into their business model.

More on this next week, hopefully!

Featured Image Credit: Lonely Planet / Vulcan Post / MyeongDong Topokki