The Artist:
Let me introduce you to Nick.
If you don’t know him already, now’s a good time to find out about this multi-talented artist and educator!
A big fan of Darkfarms, Nick’s list of internet frens extend far and wide, as he reaches into some incredible communities, including but not limited to SMOWLs, Hodlpet & AlcatrazSwimTeam.
Like myself, Nick is a student of the University of Nicosia facilitated MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) on NFTs and the Metaverse. This course is an open introductory course to NFTs and the Metaverse, delivered on-chain and in the metaverse. It’s a place where a quality web3 education has been democratised, and made available for free. This is something that resonates with Nick, as you’ll see below.
Nick is a master of both learning and teaching. Born in the USA, living in Thailand, he’s dedicated his life to education. His IRL job involves working alongside diverse teams of innovative change-makers to disrupt the traditional models of education and challenge the status quo.
Constantly on the lookout for new avenues for growth & impact, Nick runs his own blog site, consciousclassroom, creates his own regular Degen Diaries podcasts on substack, and alongside some frens, releases longer format discussional videos on Youtube under the moniker Big Announcement Coming Soon!
Recently, however, he has found himself being educated, by the memes. Specifically, frog memes, and perhaps a few punk6529 memes too.
The memes have inspired simply unbelievable relationships between all of us, and in Nick’s own words, a “professional learning network”, or perhaps we should say “pepe learning network” (either way, it’s PLN), has been established.
A PLN is a way of describing a group of people that you connect with, to share ideas, questions, reflections, and references. One's PLN is not limited to online interactions, but it is the online, global interactive nature of our PLN that really makes it special.
Those who share common habits, goals, and purposes..
Sound familiar? It should, as this is us, now. Parts of the greater sum of the Web3 movement. The whole of which is greater than the sum of it’s parts.
Nick is one smart part.
The Art:
Walking up the hill towards our next bull run, ONEPEPATATIME represents many things.
Let’s start with the communities.
On the tongue of these Dank Sneeks, you’ll find a shout out to the homie Erick Calderon (Snowfro) and his Chromie Squiggles.
Squiggles are a project that almost single handedly lit the candle for generative art, teaching us all how incredibly well traits and iterations within a generative art collection could present themselves, and even sport, as they’re even featured IRL, on the shirts of Crawley Town FC.
Shout out Squiggles & Snowfro.
Second up, as we make our way down the kick, you’ll see an easily recognisable pair of shades… to those who know. These belong to one XCOPY, a meme lord amongst meme plebs, having been created for the memes.
Shout out XCOPY.
Next you’ve got a classic “GM”, you know we love one or two of those with our cobbee’s…
Then the face of pepe, our resilient frog.
Before, lastly, our eyes rest upon those famous words…
In this case it’s feels dank man. But it could just as easily be feels _____ man… with you filling in the blank, based on your own emotion.
This shoe feels more than dank. It feels real. And this is only layer one of the final output.
Also featured in the art is WVRP #3471 by WarpSound, an audiovisual pfp project.
Shout out WarpSound.
Nick has shown us through his art, that not only is he about educating, but he’s about getting his sneakers on and making the pilgrimage, up the hill, with the rest of the frog fam.
Now, I don’t want to indoctrinate you (or do I, kek)... so, I’ll leave you to enjoy and experience the rest of ONEPEPATATIME, on your own time, and in your own mind.
Parting thought:
I’ll leave the parting thought this time to Nick:
Frogs are extremely resilient.
"In fact, it was the resilient frog friends who supported me when the chips were down. There was a time, after a series of unfortunate events, where I once considered leaving this space.
After being rekt, hacked, and margined called, I for sure thought I was done with this space for good. What followed were some of the most inspiring acts of individual and collective kindness I’ve witnessed throughout my time in the NFT space. The outpour of positive support and compassion was overwhelming. Multiple members of my PLN, largely from the SMOWL and Pepe communities, reached out to me to check in on my well-being.
The compassion displayed was so heartwarming, that it overshadowed the prior events, and restored hope in the fundamental principles and essence of what this space is meant to represent.
Not to mention it’s kickstarted my desire to share knowledge and help others.
It’s safe to say, I was green-pilled.”
Check out free NFT ArtDrop by Nick here
Associated Projects:
- Smowls by Darkfarms
- HODLPET
- The Memes by 6529
- Alcatraz Swim Team
- WarpSound
Socials/Business:
- Nick - OpenSea - Wallet
- Conscious Concepts - Blog
- Conscious Concepts - Degen Diaries Pod
- YouTube - Big Announcement Coming Soon!
