CryptoPunks creator inks massive Hollywood deal with talent firm

Larva Labs, the firm behind CryptoPunks and other top art projects, has confirmed a deal with one of Hollywood's top talent agencies

CryptoPunks creator Larva Labs has sealed a representation deal with the United Talent Agency (UTA), as per a story published in The Hollywood Reporter. The deal will help expose various non-fungible token (NFT) items to the mainstream entertainment and music industry with art projects Autoglyphs, CryptoPunks and Meebits benefiting from the arrangement. The talent agency will, on the other hand, be taking more steps into the virtual assets space thanks to Larva Labs' crypto-native IP.

Matt Hall, the co-founder of Larva Labs, revealed that the firm was looking forward to working with the talent agency. He added that the collaboration would not only bring exposure but also drive the value of the NFT collection higher. Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Lesley Silverman, who leads the Digital Assets department at UTA, spoke highly of the collaboration.

"I would say that it is one of the first opportunities for an IP that fully originated in the crypto-world to enter a broader entertainment space, and they earned it."

The particulars of the deal weren't revealed, but the engrossing NFT crypto-art project CryptoPunks stands to potentially appear in films, TV shows and even games. The other two projects might also get similar media representation. The representation deal additionally covers other areas, including publishing.

There has been a huge buzz around NFTs, with CryptoPunks standing out among the most interesting and iconic projects. The art project was launched by Larva Labs in 2017 and features 10,000 individual algorithmically created pixelated portraits of different characters on the Ethereum blockchain. It is worth noting that it was among the first NFT projects on the blockchain.

Though the characters take the form of plain little pixelated figures in different regalia, they have surged in value lately. This is because they are associated with style and wealth. CryptoPunks had virtually zero value at some point and some were given away at no cost. However, at present, the cheaper punks cost thousands of dollars while on the other end of the spectrum, the most expensive collectible punks trade to the tune of millions.

In fact, a couple of CryptoPunks fetched $16.9 million in a Christie's auction held in May, making it one of the largest NFT exchanges in history. The latest trade around these collectible punks involved Visa. Last month, the payment services provider shelled out about $150,000 on CryptoPunk #7610 – a digital avatar of a woman with a mohawk cut and green face.