Cannabis NFTs Have Arrived | Westword

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The non-fungible token or NFT craze broke the internet, and bidders vied for viral digital content that ranged from “Leave Brittany Alone” to the original “Charlie Bit My Finger” (RIP) video, which cost nearly a million dollars .

As the craze continues, more and more artists and entrepreneurs are getting involved, including Jason McHugh, founder of Califari. A graduate of the University of Colorado Boulder, McHugh worked on a number of projects with Matt Stone and Trey Parker; it was McHugh’s job to get the band Primus to compose the theme song for the South Park pilot. In 2015, he launched Califari as a cannabis lifestyle brand and worked with artists through the Global Artist Network to introduce pieces that pay tribute to classic strains like Sour Diesel and Granddaddy Purple. On April 20th The brand released its first five pieces as NFTs, with animated cards describing the genetics of each strain, starting with a version of Northern Lights for $ 310.

We met McHugh to talk about THC, NFTs, and the arts.

Westword: NFTs are really shaking the art world. What are you taking

Jason McHugh: The NFT craze is interesting because it’s a different way of seeing and using art. It kind of gave us a new way to do this. Now that we’ve dropped our first tracks and stepped into the NFT world, that’s the cool thing I discovered about it. I [also] just got hooked up last week for SuperWorld, which sells real estate from around the world and sells land so people can save NFTs which will then be seen as augmented reality for people who are in those places with that particular app.

What?

Yeah, it’s really way out there. I only got on this last week, and it’s definitely an exploding room.

What exactly is an NFT? Lots of people ask.

They are not fungible tokens, which means that an NFT is a one-of-a-kind or one-of-a-kind piece that can be detected by the blockchain and there are a lot of jokes about that, right? I’ve spoken to a lot of artists about it, and I have a good artist friend who just doesn’t give a shit about NFTs. On the other hand, however, some other artists see it as a new way to express yourself and showcase their work.

Why would anyone want to invest in NFTs? What makes it so valuable despite not having a physical copy?

It’s like having the original receipt for something. And that’s where the cynical side of it comes from: You don’t actually own the Mona Lisa, but you have a receipt saying you own it. In the world of fine arts, there’s a thing called provenance – proof of ownership – so if you bought the Mona Lisa, there was a list of wealthy aristocrats who owned these works of art, and they keep a list of what that piece sells sell to everyone Time and with every sale the value increases. That is essentially what the blockchain and NFTs are doing for digital art, which is currently the most easily reproducible type of art.

How did it all come together for Califari?

We received a call from our friends at Merida Capital [a cannabis venture capital firm]. They were just extremely excited to work with us in the NFT space, so we formed a new joint venture together called Token Hits Chateau (THC) and that’s our new company to develop NFTs. They called in February and we set the date for a release on April 20th. firmly and jumped in right away.

How did you come up with the idea of ​​an art depicting cannabis strains?

I worked on the Primus & the Chocolate Factory Tour before launching Califari. During the shows, they offered an original poster every night. And they were always sold out, and there were those long lines for those incredible posters that were usually screen printed and that impressed me when we launched Califari. I thought there should be this kind of art for cannabis strains because I find that people have similar emotional connections for their favorite cannabis strains as they do for their favorite music artists. So we hit the shoulders a bit and launched this art line in 2016.

What is special about the art of cannabis strains?

We found that art can create an emotional connection for people between their favorite varieties and we just kept going down that path. And now we are on a mission to explore the personality of cannabis through art. It is also our belief that there is no such thing as one breed of cannabis enthusiast; It’s a diverse world of people who love all aspects of cannabis and that’s why we try to get as many artistic points of view as possible. It was kind of my job to follow the trending strains and combine them with the artist who best recognizes that particular name and what kind of imagery it could conjure up.

Part of the turnover goes to the Last Prisoner Project. Why choose this non-profit organization?

For anyone working with and benefiting from the legal cannabis industry, for me it is just one of the most important nonprofits fighting for the release of nonviolent cannabis prisoners, of whom there are far too many. About 60 percent of the population believe in legalizing cannabis, and people are still in jail for it. If you study the prohibition you will see that the prohibition rules were put in place to support a racist agenda to attack blacks and browns. This has continued to this day. And we firmly believe that the Last Prisoner Project needs as much support as possible.

What is the future?

We want to continue exploring the NFT world and see where it takes us. A bigger goal is to create an additional cannabis growing machine. For Califari, we want to be an international cannabis brand, and we’ve already started that with our art and cannabis line; We hope to expand to other places one day. We are planning to introduce a new one [NFT] a bit every week during the summer before regrouping to find our next wave of NFTs to introduce.

Califari NFTs are available online through Bitski and OpenSea.

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Hilal is an alumni of the Metropolitan State University of Denver with a degree in political science. She has written for Denver Life Magazine and 303 Magazine and is currently the cannabis intern for Westword.