In an effort to provide support to the people of Ukraine, NFT digital rights management platform RAIRtech today announced its Glitch art-inspired generative NFT collection, the #UkraineGlitch (ukraineglitch.com). The project features a glitched image of the Ukrainian flag with yellow and blue pixelated ‘bullet holes’ sprinkled in the background to represent the flag under duress. Selling out the collection would provide almost $1.3 million for Ukrainian citizens in need of medical supplies; and all funds from the generative drop will be split between the purchase and shipment of medical supplies to Ukraine and the Web3 Developer fund, benefiting Ukrainian web3 developers in Ukraine.
The limited-run 1991 NFT collection represents the year that Ukrainians overwhelmingly voted for the Ukrainian independence referendum. The collection is hosted on the Ethereum mainnet with each piece priced at 0.1991 ETH (~$600 USD). Pieces can be minted at ukraineglitch.com. For more information visit www.rair.tech or @rairtech on Twitter.
“Generating these pieces was quite cathartic- and at times had me on the floor crying. What seemed like impersonal images based on squares and randomness became a map for the energetic transposition from negative to positive. The tweaking of algorithms eventually led to the perfect balance of chaos and distressed symbolism,” said Masha Mitkov, Fullstack Project Manager at RAIRtech. “My family emigrated from Ukraine to the US in the early 90’s with refugee status. When war broke out over Crimea in 2014, my father started a direct supply chain distribution of high quality medical supplies directly to the Ukrainian militia. Since his passing in November of 2020, and the onset of a new War in 2022, people have been reaching out to find ways to have access to these products again. Now the Ukrainian Coordinating Council and others have taken over what my father started. I realized I had a unique position in connecting people who needed help and those that wanted to help.”
With every UkraineGlitch purchased, the number of pixels swapped from yellow to blue increases, eventually inverting or turning the flag upside down. Some pieces are animated to show parts of this progression, while others are still. Only UkraineGlitch NFT holders can watch the full animation of the flag transformation on the launch page.
“RAIRtech has long enjoyed working with skilled Ukrainian web3 developers. We worked with several different firms and developers to create our front and back ends,” said Ed Prado, CEO of RAIRtech. “Since the war began, we found the best way to provide help to our Ukrainian friends was to send crypto. We now want to expand and open up this support effort – this is where UkraineGlitch comes in.”
RAIRtech is working with the Ukrainian American Coordinating Council, which specializes in supplying medical supplies, particularly in technologically advanced blood-clotting gauze bandages. The UACC matches supplies with hospitals and transports goods directly to them. The Web3 Developer Fund gives out small grants on a rapid as-needed basis to Ukrainian developers to help them relocate and purchase food and supplies.
ABOUT RAIRtech
RAIRtech (https://rair.tech/) Is a blockchain-based, distributed digital rights management platform that enables streaming NFTs. Currently the NFT marketplace supports public-facing images whose ownership is proven on the blockchain. With RAIR you are able to take this same NFT and attach a video, song, document or data to it. RAIR uses a decentralized key management node system to allow anyone to create NFTs that are tied to the underlying content, while also providing NFT minting, royalties & metadata management. With RAIR, creators can turn any type of media into an encrypted, access-controlled file that is accessible on any type of browser, making any digital file scarce and therefore valuable.
MEDIA CONTACT: Transform Group, rair@transformgroup.com
