While you see a Zhuk portray, there’s no mistaking it as anybody else’s work. The Azerbaijani artist’s fashion has change into a staple of Web3 over the past yr, injecting a digital-heavy NFT area with some refreshingly historical aesthetics. A 3rd-generation household artist, Zhuk brings a uniquely fashionable lens to classical figurative portray, usually depicting the human physique as if suspended in water or seen in a dreamy, flow-like state. This strategy permits her to play with form, distinction, and colour in fascinating methods.
Zhuk’s work has been featured in Time’s NFT initiative Slices of Time, collected by a number of the greatest names within the area (together with Cozomo de Medici), and featured at legacy public sale home Sotheby’s, a notable achievement for any artist. A deserving honoree of 2023’s NFT100, nft now caught up with Zhuk to speak about her work, how she bought into the NFT area, and the way she’s constructing a Web3 model to achieve past the partitions of her canvas portray.
A gradual and regular rise
In April 2021, Zhuk entered the world of NFTs when she minted Dualism — a chunk depicting a person seated in a watery atmosphere and evoking Rodin’s The Thinker — on Basis. Shortly after, the piece was purchased by NorCal Man, a collector identified for serving to shine a highlight on up-and-coming artists in Web3 by gathering their work.
“I realized concerning the NFT area from the information, and it immediately bought my consideration,” Zhuk defined whereas chatting with nft now. “I beloved the concept of an area the place you’ll be able to current your work to a large inventive viewers. My first step was the Basis platform, the place I used to be fortunate sufficient to satisfy a collector who appreciated my work. All people is aware of Norcal Man! I’m very completely happy to be part of this area.”
Since that sale, Zhuk has constantly engaged with the neighborhood, placing out one mesmerizing piece after one other. Amid a bear market, Zhuk’s 1/1s commonly promote for 15-20 ETH, numbers that appear to defy the gravity of present traits.
A contemporary lens on custom
As Zhuk comes from a protracted line of classically-trained artists, she has a pure curiosity in combining these traditions together with her modern imaginative and prescient, a mode she describes as “fashionable with a classical strategy.”
“Any viewer can attempt [my characters] on themselves so as to really feel the ambiance and feelings that I need to convey by way of the canvas.”
Zhuk
“My artwork shouldn’t be centered on the human physique particularly, no matter whether or not it’s feminine or male,” Zhuk mentioned of her work. “The picture of a personality in my works is simply a human type, which any viewer can attempt on themselves so as to really feel the ambiance and feelings that I need to convey by way of the canvas. I depict bare our bodies as a result of that is how we come into this world, bare and within the water, which I additionally use in my works. Thus, I attempt to take away your entire materials and on a regular basis layer of our life, leaving nothing else however pure emotions.”
Zhuk’s NFT drops usually revolve round historical themes, a conceptual lean maybe most evident in The Seven Virtues and The Three Graces collections, which deal within the rules and ethics of historical Greek mythology.
“Advantage promotes the enhancement of the human particular person past what has been imposed upon us by societal requirements, dominant ideologies, and our personal wounds,” Zhuk mentioned of the thematic grounding of those initiatives. “Advantage teaches us that we should assume, act, and communicate based mostly on ethical rules, not based mostly on how society or the media tells us to.”
Zhuk’s plans for the following yr are as formidable as anybody’s and embrace aspirations to collaborate with artists within the area, promote her work at Christie’s, and construct a private model by which her artwork will “prolong far past the canvas.” And after that? “Have just a bit relaxation,” Zhuk says. It’s not a nasty plan; in any case, she’s earned it.
Need extra NFT100 honoree interviews? Get the full listing of everybody we spoke with right here.
