Cal State Long Beach alumna Natalia Kochan brings tossing coins in a street performer’s guitar case into the virtual world.
Curensea is a digital platform that allows artists to express themselves and receive validation from others in the art community, as well as appreciative enthusiasm, through an online tipping service.
Kochan and co-creator Sofia Chirico wanted to make a solution for people who wanted to both share and consume art of all types. Visual artists of all kinds, writers and musicians are welcome to register and upload content on Curensea for free.
The concept of tipping became the center of their project. Artists can join Curensea and purchase Curensea coins, which they use to “tip” other art they come across. Kochan and Chirico concluded artists would receive half a penny for each Curensea coin donated to their profile. Users can later choose to keep their coins and pay the tips forward or cash out for real money.
“This generation is not so big on buying luxuries like art, because most of the time we can’t afford it,” said Chirico. “We wanted people to be able to both consume art and have an online experience through an affordable and fun way.”
Kochan and Chirico’s friendship – and partnership – began when they met at the Beijing Film Academy in China during 2011 while studying film. The site creators bonded over the struggle of trying to make money through their art, and their collective need for a creative outlet for themselves and fellow artists.
After creating Curensea in 2014, colleagues recommended that Kochan and Chirico find developers, investors and contractors in Chirico’s hometown of Germany as well as Ukraine, where Kochan’s family is from. After building a solid team, the duo finally settled in Long Beach to raise awareness of their business.
For Kochan and Chirico, creating a startup was a stressful task, but maintaining poses even more of a challenge. Curensea is ad-free for now, but it relies on the continual registration of new users and maintaining memberships by encouraging users to keep buying coins and tipping. This way, Curensea can stay above water.
“We have a plan if we ever needed to (put up ads), but they’d never be invasive or on the main page,” said Kochan. “We take a commission on coin purchases as our main source of revenue and with a lot of users, we will never have to rely on ads.”
The value of supporting young artists, especially local ones, has made sites like Etsy massively popular. But not everyone can, or wants to, purchase art. Curensea relieves the pressure of donating certain amounts and focuses solely on the value of the art and allows users who also might be struggling artists to tip out as much as they feel comfortable with.
Curensea’s tipping system is different from donate buttons – “The idea of donate buttons is that they are charity,” said Chirico. “Our system of tipping and coins is an exchange of value. People are paying for an experience and showing their appreciation for a piece.”
Curensea’s tipping model makes it unlike most artistic outlets in the cyberworld. Kochan and Chirico will keep growing and improving their site, with some interesting features and tools in the works. Their end goal and overall mission, however, will always remain the same: “value the art.” For those who want to sign up for Curensea, Kochan and Chirico are offering a promotion of ten free coins for a limited number of new users on a first come, first serve basis.
“We’ve become numb to the idea of sharing for the sake of exposure to new people,” Bryan Unger, an artist and Curensea member said. “I don’t want fame as much as I want life to be fair.”
Curensea serves as a way for artists to share their work with others and receive a sense of recognition and validation. Although users can still privately buy work from or commission each other, Curensea wants to wants to emphasize the value of art in its digital form.
“In the age of the internet, we can all get so much information and different perspectives,” said Kochan. “We know more about each other, about our struggles, and we are more willing to support each other especially through art.”