Sotheby's opens bidding for curated Bitcoin Ordinals auction

Art auction house Sotheby's has opened bidding for its curated collection of Bitcoin Ordinals.

Called "Natively Digital: An Ordinals Curated Sale," the auction contains 19 pieces — including rare Satoshis, work from the pioneering Bitcoin Ordinals artist Shroomtoshi, generative art and an item connected to the Bitcoin Ordinals brand Taproot Wizards. The auction closes on Jan. 22 at 2:00 p.m. ET. 

"This sale puts a spotlight on the incredible range of creative diversity found within the Bitcoin ecosystem, as Ordinals have seen explosive growth over the past year," Sotheby's wrote in a release. 

Sotheby’s first Bitcoin Ordinals sale

Sotheby's concluded its first auction of Bitcoin Ordinals on Dec. 13, The Block previously reported. The auction contained three pieces from the collection BitcoinShrooms, considered one of the first Bitcoin Ordinals projects ever created by Shroomtoshi. The auction fetched $450,850 upon close — five times higher than the combined estimate for the three pieces, Sotheby's noted in a statement. 

"Last month’s sale of three BitcoinShrooms was a test case to introduce Ordinals to the auction market," said Sotheby's head of digital art Michael Bouhanna in a release. "The resounding success of that sale was proof of the explosive growth of Ordinals as a new arena for artists and creators to expand the reach of digital art and collectibles and make a lasting imprint on the Bitcoin blockchain. As Ordinals continue to attract attention from collectors, this new avenue will expand the boundaries of how we conceptualize digital collectibles, as well as place a spotlight on the unique convergence of digital art and crypto culture."