Street Artist Pascal Boyart Helps Venezuelan Creators Earn Crypto

Crypto-passionate street artist Pascal Boyart, well known in the space for being the first artist in his style to affix Bitcoin QR codes to his work, is now helping Venezuelan muralists and creators earn crypto. The Paris-based “Pboy,” also famous for hiding BTC in his graffiti-meets-classic-art murals, has teamed up with local organization Satoshienvenezuela, creating a tutorial for up-and-coming creatives in the volatile nation.

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Subversion and Survival

Thanks perhaps to the subversive nature of crypto, the world of permissionless digital money and the world of art have, in a sense, always gone hand in hand. Pascal Boyart embodies this unique nexus in his works, which feature classic themes clashing with modern issues in compelling fashion. The painting he used to hide his “Bitcoin puzzle,” for example, riffs on the classic Eugène Delacroix work “Liberty Leading the People,” with the goddess of liberty herself depicted as leading the modern yellow vest protest movement.

The politically charged nature of Pboy’s art lends itself naturally to consideration of other human beings in similar unrest and crisis, and especially artists who need funding for their works. Teaming up with the Satoshienvenezuela community, Pboy has just released a tutorial breaking down step-by-step how street artists in the economically embattled South American country can earn crypto from their art.

The English version of the article, entitled “Tutorial: How to receive Bitcoin donations on your Street Art pieces,” is a highly detailed breakdown of Pboy’s methods for affixing QR codes to his art. He writes:

For 2 years, I’ve receive more than $12500 (1.20 bitcoin) on the QR codes affixed to my frescoes. These donations, which are like a form of crowdfunding, have brought me a lot in my creative process. It helped me finance my projects: buy some much needed equipment and subsequently gave me a breath of freedom for my creations.

Pboy is not pretentious or presumptive at all in his tutorial. He starts from step one, detailing for complete newbies how to make a bitcoin wallet, save the seed phrase, and create a unified Bitcoin presence on one’s various social media. Boyart goes on to outline two options for affixing Bitcoin QR codes to a work: a rather straightforward print and paste job, and a more complicated (but much more interesting) stencil and spray paint approach.

The piece culminates with a cheerful “Good luck and good creation!” and includes an FAQ section with questions like “Why use Bitcoin?” Pboy notes that “The money you receive is 100% in your possession because you are the unique owner of your private key (recovery phrase, or “Seed”), unlike other centralized means of payment (Banks, Paypal, Kickstarter, Patreon…), Bitcoin works without a third party. It is decentralized.”

“The Raft of the Medusa 2019” is inspired by the famous painting of #Géricault realized between 1818 and 1819. The scene of sinking was revisited to create an allegory of the current world through various elements added or modified compared to the original work. pic.twitter.com/Wj3JrIBdap — Pascal Boyart (@pascalboyart) September 30, 2019

The Creative Power of Crypto

As news.Bitcoin.com has reported previously, cryptocurrency is proving to be a valuable asset in the battle against poverty, hunger and inhumane political dominance in Venezuela. With artists like Pascal Boyart, charity initiatives like Eatbch and decentralized, P2P trading platforms like local.Bitcoin.com, what a government may mandate matters much less, as there is now a money that doesn’t have to be approved by an untrusted third party to be spent. So, in the name of the goddess of liberty, many artists and crypto enthusiasts alike are wishing innovators like Boyart godspeed and happy Satoshi-inspired subversion of the powers that be.

What are your thoughts on Boyart’s work? Let us know in the comments section below.

Image credits: Shutterstock, fair use.

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