Sotheby’s, however, is hoping to revive this market by auctioning non-fungible tokens by the likes of Beeple, Pak and XCopy on Sept 14.

These NFTs come from the personal collection of MaxStealth, an anonymous Australian entrepreneur. He began acquiring them in 2020, when the non-fungible token market was still in its infancy.

“Looking back on history, I truly believe that 2020 will be viewed as an iconic year in the NFT fine art space,” he said in a statement.

“The technology behind NFTs is a foundation of Web3. Total transparency, 100% provenance.”

As a crypto-art pioneer, MaxStealth has managed to get hold of some extremely rare and highly coveted NFTs by the likes of Beeple, Pak, Hackatao, Andrés Reisinger, and Trevor Jones and José Delbo. They will all go under the hammer at Sotheby’s, as part of “Inside the World of MaxStealth” sale.

The highlight of this New York auction is a piece called “Departed” by XCopy. The creations of this London-based digital artist are making an impression among crypto-collectors. One of them, titled “A Coin for the Ferryman,” sold for US$6 million last November.

The creation going under the hammer at Sotheby’s is estimated to fetch between US$600,000 and US$800,000.

The “Inside the World of MaxStealth” sale could bring in between US$2.9 million and US$4.2 million for Sotheby’s, according to Penta magazine.

The event is also an opportunity for the auction house to curry favour with crypto-collectors, the young buyers who don’t hesitate to invest large sums in NFTs.

Indeed, Millennials spent, on average, US$20,000 on crypto-art in the first half of 2021, according to the latest annual report from Art Basel and UBS. Proof, perhaps, that non-fungible tokens aren’t going anywhere yet.