Our NFT auction of the first issue of TIME from March 3, 1923 was held May 21, 2021 on SuperRare. The winning bid was for 120 ETH ($296,358). Alongside the first issue, we also auctioned the May 10, 2021 issue of TIME, which featured artwork by digital artist Beeple. It sold for 126.5 ETH ($320,741).
The First Issue
The actual, very rare edition of first issue of TIME was also included in the auction.
A note from Edward Felsenthal, Editor-in-Chief & CEO of TIME: In 1923, two young entrepreneurs launched a publication that would disrupt their industry and come to define and in many ways help shape the century to come. Founders Henry Luce and Britton Hadden said in their initial prospectus for TIME that they launched it “to serve the modern necessity of keeping people informed, created on a new principle of COMPLETE ORGANIZATION." Today, what began as a print magazine mailed to 9,000 subscribers reaches a global audience of more than 100 million across multiple mediums. And more than 5,000 issues since that first one, the cover of TIME remains some of the most valuable real estate in media--shared widely, debated, elevated. As we look toward our second century, we will continue our mission of telling stories about the people and ideas that shape the world, in hopes of doing our part to make it a better one.
A note from D.W. Pine, Creative Director of TIME: What I love about TIME’s first cover is the craftsmanship used to create it – a lithographic crayon portrait and hand-drawn line work. As TIME has shown for nearly half a century, history can be made within its iconic border whether the cover subject is rendered in oil or acrylic, photograph or line drawing, 3D render or cut paper or sculpture. The variety of presentation matches the variety of subjects. After several weeks of intense work creating the first issue, which cost 15 cents and featured 32 pages and 22 sections, founders Henry Luce and Britton Hadden still needed a distinctive cover design for their new publication. They hurriedly asked a friend at advertising agency J. Walter Thompson to create an ornate “diddling scroll” up the sides and organized pertinent information within hand-drawn boxes. As for the content, Luce paid artist William Oberhardt for a portrait of then-Speaker of the House Joseph Cannon that he created two years earlier as a commission for the government. The original of the portrait was so widely admired that it was selected to be placed on the top of the 1939 World's Fair Time Capsule.
The Beeple cover
"For our May 10th / 17th 2021 issue, artist Mike Winkelmann (aka Beeple) wanted to take our readers inside his “canvas” to depict the stratospheric acceleration of the digitization of our world by creating an image that focused on his artistic process. The cover image depicts his actual computer interface mid design, complete with a wireframe render of a figure interacting on the left and a more complete version on right. He created this digital world using Cinema 4D and OctaneRender software that is powered by nearly a dozen Nvidia graphics cards." - D.W. Pine, Creative Director of TIME “People have been creating digital artwork for the last 20 years and it has just as much craft, message, intent, as anything made on a canvas and has just as much ability to affect people emotionally and intellectually. It has been exciting through NFT’s to see people start to realize the value of this type of work and I think we’re just at the beginning of the next chapter of art history.” - Beeple