Connecting Communities Through Digital Art

Unquestionably, digital art is becoming increasingly popular, in part due to the popularity of NFTs. As a result, studios like Braw Haus are working to push the boundaries and connect digital art to community-building.

NFTevening met Justine Vilgrain and Patricia Gloum to discuss how the groundbreaking creative studio is elevating the status of digital art and taking NFTs to all four corners of the world.

What is Braw Haus?

Essentially, Braw Haus is a creative studio specializing in developing video content and showcasing digital art by working with the most innovative digital artists. Spearheaded by Justine Vilgrain and Patricia Gloum, who founded the studio in 2018, it seeks to redefine what digital art is and can be.

Justine and Patricia’s initial vision was simple: to elevate digital art and create experimental commercials. However, when the two were introduced to blockchain in 2019, their work took a Web3 turn. In early 2020, artists began to ask them for guidance on how they should work in the upcoming Web3 space. This was when Justine and Patricia realized that Braw Haus can become a truly innovative Web3-focused studio.

Braw Haus’s current work is twofold. On the one hand, Justine and Patricia help artists to get recognized and participate in Web3. On the other hand, they conceptualize commercials for brands and help them in their Web3 strategy.

“The idea is to implement art as much as possible into advertising and commercial, so elevating that medium; and have brands be more creative, more exciting and have more inspiration; rather than just have a plain artwork,” says Patricia. This work stems from their belief that digital art was not generally recognized as art until a few years ago.

Digital art as ART

“We felt that digital wasn’t accepted as an art movement. It was very underestimated,” says Patricia. Justine continues, “And on the other side, as well, in terms of commercial, everything is so flat, and it’s very kind of boring. It was missing finesse, and some colourful and some more mixed media.”

All this changed with the NFT boom and an increasingly digitized world. According to Patricia, both brands and artists now recognize that there is a whole new world they can explore. What Braw Haus is now doing is pushing both brands, as well as artists, to be unconventional and redefine what “unconventional” is.

Artists in the metaverse

As a creative studio working closely with artists, Braw Haus’s Justine and Patricia realize that there are many obstacles artists need to overcome to fully immerse themselves in the metaverse. In addition to the obvious technological obstacles, many of them are concerned about the environmental impact of NFTs and, in turn, the bad press.

As a result, they both recognised that artists need more help than marketplace suggestions. This is where Braw Haus comes in. “What we do that is different from other digital galleries in that each artist has his own marketplace that he wants to use, we have a contract with them for specific artwork and then we do the installation,” explains Justine.

“We don’t just use Twitter or Discord. We really go and create an exhibition that’s really immersive.”

A clear example of how digital media translates into real life is Braw Haus’s installation in Iraq to promote Polyone. However, it was no ordinary installation, as the UNESCO World Heritage site Erbil Irak was used.

In addition to showcasing 30 digital artists, the installation was crucial in that it brought NFTs to a new population and community. Moreover, the Braw Haus took the time to educate the Kurdistani-Iraqi community about NFTs, Web3 and the metaverse.

As Justine puts it, this “traditional monument known to the whole world has been joined and merged with this new medium, digital art, and has shown how our digital art can really be placed everywhere.” As divisive as the world is, this installation sheds light on how Web3 and the metaverse can bring people together and focus back on community.

Braw Haus is building bridges and communities

In fact, community is key to the brands Braw Haus works with. Both Justine and Patricia agree that community is what distinguishes Web3 from Web2’s way of working.

“I think the brands at the moment are like, everyone is doing this, I want to be doing this. And that’s when we come in and guide them,” says Justine. “I think whether it’s for brands or for individuals, really being part of communities and creating those communities to involve new kinds of social environment, and new kind of decision-making is crucial.”

Community-building and education are key to Braw Haus’ vision for the future. “We are planning on doing many more exhibitions like we did in Iraq, Paris and New York,” says Justine. “If we do something that no one understands, let’s educate those people to understand, and let’s make the community grow into it. So really, it’s all about teaching this vision that we have to other communities.”