-Welcome to "The Tonight Show." What should I call you?
Do I call you Beeple?
-You can call me Mike or Beeple. I'm pretty "cas."
So whatever, either way is good.
-How did Beeple come about?
What did it come from?
-So, it's a little toy from, like, the '80s.
It's this, like, Ewok-looking thing
that, like, beeps and, like, lights up.
It was never really that popular.
-Yeah, but you just got the nickname Beeple.
Yeah. Or you just took the name?
-I took the name. -You took the name.
Before we get into last night, and I'm so excited for you --
congratulations. -Thank you.
-I want to get into -- Let's explain what you do.
You're a digital artist
who sells NFTs of your artwork, is that correct?
-Yeah, so I've been making digital art
for the last like 20 years
and sort of growing in sort of popularity over that time.
But there was no way to sort of collect my work
without the, like, NFT part of it.
And, so then this technology came along, NFTs, that allow
sort of, like, ownership over something virtual.
And that allowed people to actually collect what I do,
similar to a painting or a sculpture
or any other sort of, like, artist.
And so things have gotten a little crazy since.
-Yeah. So, you just found out about NFTs?
-It was about a year ago.
And, so, my, like, fans kept coming up to me and being like,
"You know, you should check this out.
You really should check this out."
And at first, I was like, "I don't get this."
And then finally I did, and then it was like,
"This is going to be big. It's going to be big."
-I just got my first NFT. -Oh, you did? What was it?
-Through MoonPay. -Okay, there it is.
There it is. [ Cheers and applause ]
-Know what I'm talking about?
[ Cheers and applause ]
This is real.
MoonPay -- I did my homework. -Okay.
-MoonPay, which is like PayPal but for crypto.
[ Laughter ]
And I bought an ape.
-Okay, yeah, a bored ape? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-I was going to say I bought "Human One"
last night for $29 million.
-You should've, bro.
-But before NFTs, before you did this and to be able to do this,
I think NFTs are great for artists.
But what was the largest amount of money
you sold a piece of work for?
-$100, because it sort of, like, nobody was --
I wasn't trying to sell work like that.
And sort of, like, and people -- you could sell prints,
but it just -- generally people didn't do it that much.
They weren't as excited about it
versus this being sort of, like, natively digital.
People are very excited about it.
-Last night "Human One" sold for $29 million.
-It did.
-Were you there?
-Yeah, we were at the auction. My whole family was there.
I've got two young kids, and my parents were there.
And yeah, they set us up with a little booth and food and stuff.
And, yeah, it was definitely very surreal.
-But it's fascinating. It's a great piece of art.
It's an astronaut just continuously walking.
-Yeah, it's a giant metal box that has, like,
a bunch of screens on it, and it's slowly rotating.
And it kind of, like, creates this illusion.
-We have video footage.
-Inside this kind of, like, void.
So, it's like a metal --
It's a giant, like, refrigerator-sized box
that just keeps turning,
and the environment will continue to change.
And I think that's what's exciting about this piece
and I think is more analogous to sort of the future of art,
is that we'll have pieces in our house that continue to change
and sort of -- it's not just a static painting that just --
it is what it is.
I think we're going to have more things like this.
-Yeah. The first time I heard about you was another auction.
Your work sold for $69 million.
Put you in top three most valuable living artists
in the world, buddy.
-It's been a year. -It has been a year, pal.
But let me tell you something -- [ Laughter ]
It's been a year, yeah. I just love the story.
I love the American dream because, you know, you were
happy before you sold -- when you sold things for $100.
-Yeah. -And having a great life.
You have a great wife, kids and mom and dad -- I met them.
And then this -- this collage, I guess you call it.
-Yeah, yeah. -Called "Every Days,"
you started doing it 14 years ago.
You painted every single day.
-Yeah, I do a picture every single day.
Started in 2007 and it's done, start to finish that day.
They're mostly done -- No, they're done
on the computer, most of them.
Some of them were drawn in the very, very beginning.
But almost all of them are done in the computer each day.
-But you had no clue that NFTs would ever exist.
-No. Before the blockchain.
That was before, like, any of this stuff.
-What is your wife saying to you?
Like, "Honey, what are you doing with all these digital paintings
you -- every single day since 2007?"
-Yeah, well, and that's the thing.
Like, they had brought in a bunch of work.
Like, I've done, you know, concert visuals.
And I was sort of, you know, growing a following
and getting better and better sort of freelance work
from these pictures. -They're gorgeous. Amazing.
-I appreciate that.
-I want to show a couple of these.
-Oh, boy. Oh, boy.
This is not -- I don't -- Okay. That one's okay.
-This first one,
this is different than your other stuff, right?
-Yeah, this was the -- [ Laughter ]
This was the absolute, very first one.
And that is a picture of my Uncle Jim that I drew.
I don't know why I drew it that day.
It was just like, "Okay, I'm going to start this thing.
Obviously could not have imagined that, you know,
14 years later now -- -It's on "The Tonight Show."
-There it is. -There you go Uncle Jim, yeah.
But then this is more the type of Beeple stuff I'm like --
This is called "Jabba the Pooh/Winnie the Hutt."
[ Laughter ]
-Okay, I don't know.
That's, uh -- Some of them are weird.
I will say some of them are weird.
[ Laughter ]
-This one might be one of my favorite ones.
This one's called "First Emoji." -There you go.
-Our ancestors building -- or someone building Rome?
Who knows? -Yeah, I was just kind of
trying to imagine if they were, like, building this weird thing
that they didn't even understand why they were building
this emoji or what it is. [ Laughter ]
Back in medieval times.
This was actually the day my daughter was born, and --
[ Laughter ]
I had to do it very quickly before we went to the hospital.
[ Laughter ] Which doesn't sound great,
but it was like two minutes, so yeah.
[ Laughter and applause ]
-And this one's just called "Hey."
[ Laughter ]
Okay, yeah, self-explanatory. [ Laughter ]
-I think we're good there.
I think we're pretty good there, yeah.
-Do you have any advice for people who want to
get into this or get into what you're doing?
-Yeah, there's tons of tutorials out there.
And there's, you know, free software out there as well.
And I think it's something that, you know,
takes a lot of work and practice.
And, again, I've been, you know, making digital art for 20 years.
So it's not going to be kind of an overnight thing.
But I think you're going to see a lot of people do this
and a lot more sort of, you know, artists kind of take
this approach just because it is another way you can kind of,
you know, monetize and sort of make a living.
-Congratulations on everything, buddy. I'm a fan.
Please come back. -Thank you so much.
-We'll follow your career.
Beeple, everybody!