Kumu, in partnership with Likha NFT and Draper Startup House Manila held its first offline Kumunity NFT Hangout last April 9, 2022 at Draper Startup House Manila.

The session featured local NFT artists Gian Suyat, Francis Lim, and Jakestudyos, joined by Kenji, Gelo, and Raphael from Likha NFT/BayaniChain. Likha NFT, a brainchild of BayaniChain, is the first Filipino NFT marketplace providing an intuitive gateway for brands, artists, and collectors to mint, market, and manage their digital assets.

Entering the world of NFTs and Crypto might seem overwhelming at first with the amount of information you have to learn to understand and practice it. But as we’ve seen and heard from the stories of the community last Saturday, many Filipinos are starting to enter and thrive in this space!

Gian started making NFTs around September 2021. His approach is to draw what he fears. Because of his phobia of birds, much of his Rembrandt inspired artworks portray bird features.

“Aside from being an artist, you have to be a marketer. Treat your first months as a way to experiment and carve your identity”, Gian advises to new NFT artists.

Jakestudyos also got started with NFTs in August 2021. As a visual artist, he makes colorful and unique illustrations. Approaching a year into creating NFTs, his goal now is to collaborate with more artists. Another artist that joined the session is Francis, a watercolorist and NFT artist with works showcasing dreamy urbanscapes such as LA and Shibuya. Francis decided to start selling his works when he became one of the exhibitors in Gallery Buenas Artes headed by the Father of Philippine Art workshop, Fernando Sena.