Digital art collective UnicornDAO raised of $4.5 million for empowering women and LGBTQ artists


Today Digital
art collective UnicornDAO announced that it had raised of $4.5 million led by
ConsenSys Mesh which is Bored Ape Yacht Club creators Yuga Labs, and others. The
funds will go toward empowering artists who identify as women and LGBTQ-led
non-fungible token (NFT) initiatives, with members from every corner of the NFT
market coming together to participate in the round.
The members in
the funding round were MoonPay, World of Women, Tribute Labs, Quantum, Flamingo
DAO, The LAO, Wave Financial, Collab Currency, Polygon, and Big Sky Partners, including
digital artist Mike Winkelmann (better known as Beeple) and recording artist
Sia.
According to a press
release UnicornDAO has invested $1.4 million in NFT artworks from
underrepresented groups in Web3.
In a statement
Nicole Muniz, CEO at Yuga Labs said "We are happy to support UnicornDAO's
mission to fund businesses and purchase NFTs created by women and LGBTQ+ people
to help onboard new creators to Web3,”. Further added, the Yuga Labs team will
donate a seat in the UnicornDAO to an LGBTQ+ or woman leader in the space who
may not be able to afford the costs.
In an interview
Tolokonnikova confirmed that currently they are focussing on supporting Web 3
artists. In future they have plans to work with more traditional art forms as
well. During the last year of his crypto journey, he met all of their curators
personally. Pussy Riot's ethos has been to bring equality and joy to
underrepresented groups for over 10 years. According to the press release it is
expected that to advancing the DAO’s efforts members of UnicornDAO are expected
to contribute both their capital and time with initial investors being granted
board seats.
On Sunday
recording artist Grimes announced that she had joined the UnicornDAO board and
donated the video for "New Gods" to the DAO. This week general public
applications to join the UnicornDAO as member are now open. On June 21 at the
DAO’s event at NFT.NYC more information will be announced. As part of
Tolokonnikova's activism, UnicornDAO also announced UnicornRiot, an activist
group focused on fundraising and organizing for reproductive rights in the
United States.
Decentralized
autonomous organizations, or DAOs, are online communities with a common goal
using a common treasury, smart contracts (programs that execute when criteria
are met), and tokens to vote on proposals.
About
UnicornDAO :
In March 2022 UnicornDAO was launched by Nadya Tolokonnikova, a social activist and founding member of the
Russian art collective Pussy Riot. Most recently Tolokonnikova who has been an
activist in the art world for over a decade got involved with UkraineDAO in a
project that sold an NFT of the Ukrainian flag for $6.75 million to raise money
for Ukraine’s war efforts against Russia in March. According to UnicornDAO, it
is a feminist movement that consists of Web3 natives who are creating
much-needed equality in the Web3 space by utilizing Web3-based tools. John
Caldwell and Rebecca Lamis are also there along.
NFT
personalities Beeple and Gary Vaynerchuk are prominent members of the DAO, with
investment from NFT collections World of Women and Moonbirds, crypto trading
app MoonPay, blockchain network Polygon and Yuga Labs, the creators of Bored
Ape Yacht Club NFTs.

Indrani Bose
CBW - External Analyst
INDIA