A ginger camel, ginger knight, dog or pig: Tim Aarts from Hilvarenbeek has them all. Five months ago, the special ginger pieces became famous on Marktplaats and people offered big money for them, whether or not as a joke. Tim was serious and bought six beautiful ginger specimens. He has since turned it into works of art. He will soon be selling these as NFTs, which are online works of art.
Last December he went all over the internet: the ginger camel. More than two thousand euros were offered on Marktplaats, but Tim was one of the few buyers who was seriously interested. In the end he got his hands on it for 250 euros. “Yes, that’s quite a lot for a piece of ginger, but the seller didn’t sell it for less”, Tim laughs. “I’ve never regretted it.”
He decided to buy even more ginger animals. Tim now has pieces of ginger in the shape of a knight, elephant, dog, pig, deer and of course the famous camel. “I saw a huge amount on Marktplaats and secretly bought the nicest pieces,” he recalls.
Fortunately, they were less popular than the camel and therefore less expensive. “People still got a nice price for it, but that was about a few tens.”
“I still look to see if I see something cool in the supermarket.”
It became a real obsession, because Tim even started looking for special ginger animals in supermarkets. He was less successful there. “You must have a piece where you can immediately see what it is. I haven’t found that in the store yet, but I’m still looking to see if I see something cool.”
Tim has now turned it into works of art. That is not new for him: for his YouTube channel Weekend Builders he makes videos in which he shows how he makes things from wood, steel and epoxy, among other things. His channel attracts millions of viewers worldwide. “I pour almost everything in epoxy, so I wanted to try that with this one as well.”
“The ginger figurines took me a good month and a half.”
Epoxy is a kind of resin, which you can layer over things, explains Tim. “It’s quite a process, because after each layer you have to wait a few days before you can continue. The ginger camel has already taken me a good month and a half.”
The result: the pieces of ginger look like they are in a glass figurine. “They all turned out pretty well,” Tim says, looking proudly at his artwork.
But then of course the question arises: what should you do with those ginger figurines? “I wanted to make NFTs out of it and I thought: I’m just going to see if that works.”
NFT stands for non-fungible token. “You have to think of it as digital art. A kind of collection of flippos or Pokémon cards, but online. You have rare and less rare and you can buy them from each other on a special marketplace for NFTs.”
According to Tim, such a digital artwork can be a photo, video or music file.
The NFTs of the gingers are movies. He sells a total of 66 of these. Six of those films are exclusive: there is only one copy and the buyer also receives the actual statue. The cost per video? “Just under two thousand dollars.” That is converted almost 1900 euros.
So Tim has earned back that 250 euros from the ginger camel.
ALSO READ:
Ginger camel on Marktplaats is sold: Tim turns it into a work of art
Ginger art floods Marktplaats after guinea pig chip and ginger camel