Yoshikazu “Yoshi” Tsugiyama
Daikanyama.eth | Boston, Massachusetts
I collect to preserve cultural memory.
My collection spans contemporary art, Ethereum-native art, NFTs, trading cards, and other cultural artifacts.
Each of these fields has its own history, forms of ownership, and market structures. Yet they raise a common set of questions.
What is worth preserving? How does cultural significance emerge? And how can an artwork, an object, or an idea retain its meaning across generations?
I am interested not in the attention something receives at the moment of its creation, but in what remains after that moment has passed.
Beyond Medium
I do not regard physical and digital art as opposing categories.
Whether a work exists on canvas, is printed on paper, or is associated with a blockchain does not, by itself, determine its cultural significance.
What matters to me is its artistic expression, historical context, provenance, and relationship to the culture from which it emerged.
Ethereum-native art holds a particular place in my collection.
Blockchain technology introduced new ways to record and transfer ownership of digital tokens, make transaction histories publicly accessible, and build communities around works of art. These developments expanded the possibilities for artistic expression and circulation while raising new questions about authenticity, permanence, ownership, and value.
But the existence of an NFT does not make a work important. Nor does the persistence of a token’s transaction history guarantee the preservation of the artwork itself.
I am drawn to artists, works, and communities whose historical significance may endure long after the market excitement surrounding them has faded.
The work of XCOPY and the culture surrounding early Ethereum art, including communities such as The Doomed DAO, are important parts of this interest.
My collecting, however, is not limited to the digital realm.
Contemporary art, sports cards, and other collectibles each have their own histories and cultural contexts. Their significance emerges through different combinations of artistic expression, social influence, historical importance, scarcity, provenance, and collective memory.
I do not see these objects as interchangeable investments, but as distinct forms of evidence of the cultures and eras from which they emerged.
Value and Time
Cultural significance and market value are related, but they are not the same.
Price reflects a market’s assessment at a particular moment. Historical importance, on the other hand, may take decades to become widely recognized.
Some objects attract extraordinary attention upon their release, only to be forgotten over time. Others remain overlooked for years before later generations rediscover their significance.
As both a collector and an investor, I am interested in how these forms of value develop.
Supply, provenance, ownership structures, liquidity, and information asymmetry all influence how cultural assets are valued. So do the technologies and infrastructures through which they are discovered, evaluated, and exchanged.
Studying these forces is an integral part of my collecting practice.
Scarcity alone, however, does not establish cultural importance. Nor does a high market price today guarantee that value will endure.
I continue to examine the distance between what markets recognize in the present and what future generations may consider worth remembering.
Time can erode value, but it can also reveal significance.
What survives, and what is forgotten?
The answer cannot be found in short-term price movements alone.
The Responsibility of Ownership
For me, collecting does not end with acquisition.
I believe ownership carries a responsibility to understand a work, document it where possible, and preserve its historical context for the future.
How was it created? Who made it? Which people and communities shaped its reception? How has it circulated over time?
These histories can be as important to a work’s lasting significance as the object itself.
This responsibility is especially relevant to digital art. A token may continue to exist on a blockchain even if the associated artwork, metadata, or the infrastructure required to access it no longer survives.
Understanding and documenting the technological, historical, and cultural context surrounding a work is therefore as important as acquiring it.
Through DCOMA (Daikanyama Contemporary & Onchain Museum of Art), I pursue the collection, research, and documentation of cultural assets, including contemporary art, Ethereum-native art, and the history of NFT art.
DCOMA is an independent collection and research archive built around my personal collecting and research activities.
Its purpose is not to display ownership as a symbol of status.
It is to preserve, as far as possible, traces of the artistic expressions, ideas, and cultural developments of our time, along with the ways they were understood and valued.
I do not believe I can predict with certainty what history will ultimately recognize as important.
That uncertainty is precisely why I continue to observe, develop independent judgment, and revise my views when necessary.
Silence, solitude, patience, and discipline.
These principles shape my collecting practice, just as they inform other pursuits in my life, including marathon running and fly fishing.
I value sustained observation over momentary excitement, and independent judgment over external validation.
For me, collecting is an ongoing inquiry into what deserves to be remembered.
Official Profile
DCOMA / Daikanyama Gallery
日本語版 / Collector Statement Japanese Version
Yoshikazu Tsugiyama
Collector, Investor & Founder of DCOMA