Greenwich, Connecticut, a suburb of New York City, is one of the wealthiest towns in the world. What remains of the original indigenous inhabitants of the land, while not invisible, can be hard to see. The land was commodified by settlers nearly four centuries ago. The native Siwanoy people were mistreated and removed from their land, but a friendly narrative of sharing of the land is used to justify the virtually infinite wealth of today’s inhabitants. Massive estates now sit on streets with indigenous names. Property owners bolt convex mirrors to trees to make sure they can see everything behind them clearly, to keep their expensive cars safe as they leave their wide driveways. But rearview vision can be distorted. These mirrors make everything look like a funhouse, and make it difficult to escape seeing one’s own reflection.
In my first NFT project, I am reflecting on the perils of commodification in the context of what seems like the latest technology to encourage it. When property ownership moves from the ephemeral to the physical or from the physical to the ephemeral, what is lost? Is anything gained? For whom? What stories do we tell to justify our decisions, and what distorted mirrors do we employ to look back and feel safe?
