Page 24 - Arts Management Magazine Future Issue

AMM INTERVIEW

Professor Dr. Christoph Meinel

Blockchains, fractionalization ownership, and the future of art, with Professor AMM: In light of your recent talk at the German House, how is
Dr. Christoph Meinel the art market flawed for buyers and sellers?
Professor Dr. Christoph Meinel: The art market today lacks
Professor Dr. Christoph Meinel is Dean of the Digital Engineering Faculty transparency. Buyers and sellers run the risk of being involved in
of the Potsdam University and Director and CEO of the Hasso Plattner counterfeit numinous businesses. What is needed is an electronic,
Institute for Digital Engineering. Meinel is author/co-author of 10 books transparent, secure and accessible platform for everyone with the
and 12 anthologies, as well as editor of various conference proceedings. More relevant data on the artworks.
than 600 of his papers have been published in high-profile scientific journals
and at international conferences. AMM: Can blockchain technology solve those flaws, and offer
more security and transparency?
In recent years, there has been plenty of talk of the “financialization” of Dr. CM: Today, the use of blockchain technology is not only lim-
art. As prices soar to new levels and digital technology opens new markets, it ited to cryptocurrency, but the technology is used as a program-
has become possible to democratize major artworks through the sale of small mable distributed trust infrastructure. Another term for block-
segments in those works using new blockchain technologies and cryptocurren- chain technology, “Distributed Ledger Technology,” represents
cies. AMM sat down for an interview with the thought leader in this space, the most widespread use case of blockchain technology: as a so-
Professor Dr. Christoph Meinel. called distributed “accounting book.”

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