The concept of the NFT evokes strong reactions. It's loud, youthful, and somewhat obnoxious presence in the art world imposing itself as a medium that cannot be ignored. NFTs play between art and technology. So much that has yet to be actualized. exciting new ways for patrons to intimately support creatives. Sailing with them through artistic endeavors and explorations.

Indigo kids did not start with the intentions of being an NFT project, the aesthetic and philosophical congruence was foraged throughout the friendship between artists Armyan Nispel and Robert Valle; “dharma brothers” that met at Art Center College of Design, their complimentary appreciations within design and spirituality has lead to multiple collaborations while attending school. Armyan invited Robert to live at his “art trap house”, (also referred as an “art frat” by visitors and later known as the collective “Ætlas Vision”, a chaotic harmony of 7 multidisciplinary artists that all crammed under the roof of a 3 bedroom house by the mountains of Altadena.) While working Robert and Armyan began to build a “fashion collection for another world” and sketch the Indigo kids' Lore, along with a range of garments, accessories and began to world-build the beginning of the “Æverse”.

The moment this imaginary landscape came to a tipping point we began to form our first official Ætlas project. Armyan’s online friend and crypto guru Soban Saquib came to visit Æ headquarters for the first time and saw what they had been up to, he preached the significance of digitizing their art as NFTs. He had been collecting and fundamentally understood the potential. Soban went on to advise Ætlas's first group NFT drop, “First Impact”, Soby encouraged Robert and Armyan to start designing generative assets for a profile picture project with the worldbuilding they had already laid out in piles of concepts and sketches. They packed all of their belongings and road tripped across the country, starting from LA hoping to find a less chaotic studio space in NY where they could continue to expand the build.

Once they arrived in the city with little to no plan or money, chaos was all they found; nomadically Airbnb hopping from shared apartments in Brooklyn to project buildings in Harlem, Carrying all of their belongings with them everywhere they went, and working at any public work space they could find, “the discomfort was almost comical!” Armyan said as he recounts when Robert almost got mugged for his Ipad that contained heaps of unbacked illustrations. Despite the chaos they maintained focus on seeing the vision through, even restarting the entire project from scratch a total of 3 times because of dissatisfaction with visual direction and symbolic values. They both agreed that we wouldn't stop until they created something that they were proud of.

Robert described his relation with Indigo Kids, saying;

“The online persona adds an extension to who we are. When I think of Soby I think of what he looks like in person as well as the profile picture he has set online, there are multiple versions of him, and when I see him tweet they actually read differently based on what is being displayed as his pfp. The social dynamics of the online persona has bled into the real world when previously our online ego was more disconnected and more prone to toxic trolling. Now I find It's important to have a space where we can make mistakes and grow without the social pressures of cancel culture. Having an indigo kid as a PFP can affect the way people view themselves and their actions online and encourage more awareness and intention on online platforms. As far as my relationship with designing Indigo Kids, Japanese design has always been something that I implement into my work, particularly how the philosophy of Wabi Sabi has impacted my exploration of traditional printmaking and ceramics. So with Indigo Kids I knew that had to be implemented in some way and the nature of the pfp project leans towards a perfectionist workflow, so that things generate correctly and methodically. Because we are collaborating with an algorithm, I see the process of random generation as the purest form of Wabi Sabi, The algorithm mimics the circumstantial systems within nature itself. Complete submission to the algorithm.

Armyan goes on to describe his experience with NFTs, saying; “Despite the polarizing reputation of the profile picture NFT format; commonly criticized for it being adopted by so many superficial money grabbing apes *cough* opportunists, I personally saw Indigo Kids as a chance for us to lace together Robert and my esoteric fascinations and curate them into an idealized enlightened deity, and use the project as a tool to inject high values into the consciousness of the crypto space and beyond. I see indigo kids as quantum art piece. My traditional painting has been a process of choosing one idea among many and linearly creating a single image, while the nature of a generative project calls for a drastically different workflow, instead of working within the confines of a solitary image it allows for all my ideas to be stored and expanded on later. Designing an indigo kid means throwing a portrait into a multiverse and allowing the algorithm to create unique personalities that I am incapable of thinking of, almost bringing the art to life. Because the circumstance of the code determines so much of the visual outcome, the process was truly a collaboration between 3 artists, Robert, myself, and the computer.”