Nicola Anthony

Non FUngible Destinies

2021, UK

Non Fungible Destinies (NFD)

Containing: fortunes, magic spells, genetic code, block chain, big data and delicate hopes, cut into peeled paint, and suspended in a glass bottle

Individual Size: 16.5cm x 7cm x 3 cm
Series of 16 as installation, size variable

This artwork is available on my online shop here

Can we predict the future? When I look forward I envision a world where we rely on both faith and science to help us survive.

Both have been needed more than ever in the past year. It has made some things from the past make sense – like incantations which were spoken to ward off evil, and are not that different to our pandemic slogans, mantras and memes. I have begun to think about faith in all its forms – religion, self belief, faith in the good of other people, conviction in our ability to keep going, the magic of hope….

In the past, communities have used seasons, the positions of the stars, the shadows cast by standing stones as predictors. Today, scientists are busy decoding genomes and viral sequencing our new predators, and all over the globe google is also capturing data – the searches, curiosities, questions and queries which we collectively seek. I see this data as a soft, intimate, poetic glimpse into humanity, where in future we will begin to see both the rejection and an adoption of science, magic, faith, belief, the realisation that more than one reality can exist at any one moment.

Big data has become the ‘standing stones’ of our times, the predictor of the future, the connected mind. Over the past year I have been collecting the top searches across the UK, capturing each day as a moment in time. These search terms – “Banana bread recipe”, “intensive care, “nightingale hospital”, “meaning of furlough” began to string together like a poem of our times, a bottled up predictor of the next moments for humanity. This research and thought process combined in my art studio with an icon of the bottle as a container of potions, hedonism, alchemy, science, progress… The bottle can also contain a message from the past or from afar – an SOS, and a warning that we may ignore or take heed of in order to shape our future.

The Dali Lama has said “As human beings, we all share the same sorrows, the same hopes, the same potential. The Covid-19 pandemic has reminded us how interdependent we are: what happens to one person can soon affect many others, even on the far side of our planet.”

This artwork is available to purchase on my online shop, take a look here.