Behind the Kitty Paradise: Yumi Arts

Who's Yumi Arts? How did she start with NFTs and Crypto?

I’ve been drawing pixel art for many years, but always considered it a hobby. IRL I’m a student going for 2nd degree in psychology, so I was pretty far from art in education part. I joined crypto in 2017 with some spare money – bought BTC and ETH, lost a lot in ICOs. Then I’ve been constantly trading and researching (and continuing to do so even now). I minted my first NFTs on ETH, but they didn’t sell and I forgot about them. And then I started reading about DOT ecosystem

You are one of the biggest artist of Singular with 7 collections and being top 3 artist by volume. What made you choose Singular as the platform to mint your art?

My friends told me about Kanarias not long ago before I started my career. It’s really amazing what RMRK team is developing and it’s a shame that I had to buy birds on 2nd hand market. But after researching a bit, I found that there is a full-scale marketplace on Singular and decided to post some arts there. I never expected the Kitty collection to explode like it did and now spending 99% of my free time to support and expand it.

What makes Singular different from other spaces is the community. You can ask any person from a top collection owner to Bruno himself – and they will actually help you! I never seen any other platform being so friendly and helpful.

You are at the heart of the Kusama NFT community, where do you see the platform/community in the upcoming months?

I don’t like being maxi on something, but RMRK has one of a kind community, team and ambitions. I’m sure as RMRK 2.0., MOVR bridge and other functionalities start working, a whole new era will start. There isn’t a single NFT space that has same possibilities as RMRK, so I’m sure it will be leading platform in Crypto NFT sphere.

Doge, Shiba, Floki… all dogs, why did you choose kitties?

Uh, well because I love cats! You can see from my Dreamscapes collection (and some Kitties) that I like drawing a bit darker stuff too, but most amazing for me is to combine different styles, characters and moods in one metacollection.

Do you have any advice for any new artist that’s thinking to mint its own art on Singular about how they can create a successful collection?

I can tell that being sincere is really important. What I noted that almost every top collection (including mine) is being built by people without much experience, but we all improvise and try to create something new.

What are your favorite NFT collections on Singular?

Honestly, I can never list all of them, so I just tell what came to my mind first. Kings, Apes’n’Art, Shibamojis, Marlua’s Emotions, Chao-Samas, Substranauts, Ku Shibas and arts by Luigi Lucarelli, BUT…

…There are LOTS of other artists that do AMAZING job and I made this list incredibly short, it doesn’t represent even a half of people I admire.

Kitties will be someday in the metaverse, recently you posted a tweet about revenue share and Kitty Treasury, any more heads-up you want to give us about the future of the kitties?

Sure! I’ll drop some alpha here A % of sales will go into treasury that will allow Kitty Gang to buy and raffle NFTs between the community – Kanaria raffle already begins ASAP. Later there will be many more uses of the treasury.

There will also be NFTs that grant % of sales to holders each month, I wanted to make it long time ago and we are already near Kitty #200, so it’s time to begin. It’s a perfect way to expand and make the community even more active than ever. That’s only the beginning of revenue sharing system and I’m planning to develop it further once RMRK 2.0. comes out. My collections will be adapted to this technology and Kitty Holders will receive HUGE benefits once we go to the next chapter.

How you come up with all the new designs for Kitty paradise? So far 190 created and they all look really original!

I spent my lifetime watching movies, reading books and playing games, so that’s not too hard to imagine new stuff

Top Sale

Are you following closely the crowdloans? If yes, what are the projects you are following the closest?

Yes! My most anticipated projects are Subsocial, Bit.Country and Picasso, I’m really bullish on them. There will also POSSIBLY be some collaborations with parachains, so expect Kitty news as always.

What would you like to see in the NFT space in the the future? (Metaverse, gaming, revenue sharing…)

I really hope to see real games and real metaverses. Currently a lot of games only pretend to be games, but I expect to see a lot of developments this/next year. There are lots of insane projects that are only being born, for example Kanaria metaverse!

What’s the biggest value of being part of the Kitty Gang?

People who joined the Kitty Gang put huge trust in my work and I won’t disappoint them. There is, of course, monetary value - we went from 0.2 to 7-8 KSM floor and collection is not complete yet.

There are airdrops – DreamBits are only beginning here. There will be access to special collections, collabs and possibly even metaverse scale collaborations. Once collection is minted, I will begin the new era of Kitties and start working on the RMRK 2.0. implementation. Kitty holders will have extreme benefits there. And of course, community! We have great people supporting Kitties, including most famous figures in KSM NFT sphere.

Helpful Links: Yumi's Twitter Profile Yumi's RMRK space Kitty's Discord