Pizza-loving 6-year-old artist grabs a slice of NFT market
Emilio Barrera is a normal 6-year-old kid.
The soon-to-be first grader loves pizza, video games and drawing.
It’s his art – one drawing fetched almost $1,000 – that stands him apart from his peers.
One day while his father Cecilio Barrera, a staff member of the California School Boards Association, who participated in plenty of Zoom meetings from home got a break when his son finished an online class.
“This is what I did,” he said, holding up a drawing that caught dad’s attention.
“We were like, wow! Very impressed,” said Carlos. “But, as parents, you think that everything your child does is awesome.”
Cecilio showed the drawing to a Bay area friend who happens to be an artist. The response:
“Those are some straight lines. Boy, that’s a talent that he was able to draw with clean lines.”
Emilio started doing more and more drawings. After all, his father reasoned, “he had all the time in the world because of the pandemic.”
Since then, Emilio has sold his drawings as NFTs (non-fungible tokens). NFTs are a unit of data stored on a digital format called a blockchain. The NFTs are photos, videos or other types of digital files that are certified to be unique.
The owner, in this case Emilio, retains ownership of the original drawing. Copies of the sold product can be resold, but the original owner gets a percentage of those sales.
‘Full of Promise,’ Emilio’s first drawing to be sold as an NFT, is 20”x30.” That overshadows the 4-foot-1 budding artist.
He is also working on a 36x48 piece.
“I draw with my eyes and with what’s in my mind,” said the left-handed Emilio about his inspiration.
Emilio’s first drawing to be sold as an NFT was ‘Cool Pizza.’ The 6-minute work was snapped up for $2.
“I thought this was so great,” said Cecilio about the price.
Through June, Emilio had sold 47 pieces. The art sells for about $90 online.
That was three months ago.
Another drawing, ‘Pizza Party,’ made more money because multiple copies were sold. Emilio figures his son has made more than $4,000 off his drawings. Ten percent of his sales goes to the Poverello House.
Cecilio calls Emilio a “typical artist” because he doesn’t like to be videotaped while working on a piece.
Recently, Emilio got a tablet and he immediately began drawing on it.
Neither parent owes up to artistic talent, although his mother Lupita, a professor of Spanish at Fresno State, does admire art.
Being the one in charge of Emilio’s activities, Lupita figured drawing would be a good activity for him.
Emilio’s artistic touch comes in handy at home. When Lupita announced a shopping trip to decorate Emilio’s bedroom, Emilio said there was no need. He’d take care of it.
“No, I have an idea. I’m going to draw everything and then you’re going to hang them,” he said.
Emilio uses regular Crayola markers for his drawings, although he has started dabbling with digital art on his tablet.
He is currently collaborating with a 12-year-old girl from New York on an art piece that is a collection of ice cream. Plans are to finish that work in the fall.
Drawing is not his only passion. He also plays the piano and enjoys playing tennis.
A collection of his artwork can be found at emilio and nyla’s ice cream truck – https://opensea.io/