Crypto Art

Crypto art is undervalued, underestimated and underutilized in taking our message to a mass market. For greater adoption to happen we need to grow our audience and fast. In this article, I will introduce you to an incredible artist who is without a doubt, exactly what we as an industry need.

When I started creating content in the crypto-space back in 2016, it was an exciting time characterized by total confusion, at least for someone new to the space. I have a technical background and started a PKI, Public Key Infrastructure consultancy in 1999. I have been around IT engineers for 25 years, running projects and building tech companies with them so I understood much of the technical jargon. The revenge of the nerds was well underway in the Crypto space in 2016. The media being produced however could only be understood by techies, hardcore techies. The news websites were a mess of multi-coloured flashing banners urging you to get in fast on some badly named project with equally bad branding, it was ‘sell, sell, sell’. It was against this background that I wanted to start documenting what I saw as the seismic shift incoming in tech, finance and society. Crypto looked set to take the world by storm.

The first 10-20 years in Crypto have been about science experiments. The next 10 years need to be about educating the masses on what has been achieved and what is here right now. The best way to take the achievements in Crypto to a huge audience is through art. Art speaks to the masses, whether it is great architecture, a painting, or a TV show. Crypto needs this now, we need to push forward to mass adoption and trumpet the best people and projects with a message that will captivate. With this as my mindset, it was with huge delight that I came across someone who thinks this way and is taking Crypto to more than just the converted.

Meet Vesa

Vesa is a Crypto artist, performer and super cool guy. Many people got to know him when he worked with Bollywood actress Veena Malik in a stunning collaboration. It was seen by 300 million people through BBC World, The Independent, IBT, Times of India, VICE and numerous other media outlets. In his words, he ‘forked’ his mixed-media platform Artevo in 2017 to Art For Crypto. There are some amazing people in the Crypto space and I think Vesa is one of them. You can check out his work here.

His art has been collected by hedge funds, exchanges, CEO’s and influencers and as Crypto enters into mainstream consciousness his client base will no doubt expand rapidly. Savvy investors would be well advised to expand their portfolios to include some of his work. Vesa is documenting such huge moments in human history in an incredible way. Amazingly there is little else out there that is close to being comparable. Vesa understands the power of art and Crypto, so do the Litecoin foundation. They are the latest to commission his work and in this video, we get the first look at it. Vesa will be presenting it in October at the Litecoin summit

I was very pleased to introduce Vesa to Didi Taihuttu, of the Bitcoin family. Didi is a close friend, a frequent source of inspiration and helps with the Hardforking media. Didi is also speaking at the Litecoin summit and I will have both the guys on a podcast next week. Didi and the family are on their ‘Sharing is caring’ world tour. Learn about that here.

Crypto needs more quality art, media and personalities. I love to help support people like Vesa. To often Crypto is just a price and a quick buck. The successful projects will embrace people like Vesa, Didi and others like them. They do much for our industry and will only grow in importance as the wider public learns about us. Let us be honest, some good Crypto PR would not go a miss after 2018’s cluster fork.

Taking Bitcoin to a mass market is a real challenge. Price speculation is not enough.

Within Bitcoin, the space I know, getting any assistance is almost impossible. I have created most of my content myself. The Bitcoin community can be harsh on each other and I think we would be much further ahead in adoption if support was offered to artists and content creators. Bitcoin has no marketing, Barry Silbert’s advertising aside, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. This will make it difficult for the likes of myself to keep educating and promoting Bitcoin. I have been filming a reality series for the last six months to better understand the different Crypto communities and cultures. As someone immersed in Bitcoin for years it’s been pleasing to see other good projects are out there and as such I will start covering them. Better late than never.

You can help in your own small way by subscribing to our youtube channel where you can see that content. I’m in talks with various projects now so hopefully, the Crypto community will start to see that we need to get our message out to a wider audience with more than flashy banners. As a Crypto community lets help support each other. You get the occasional great moment where a dev will flag a competing chains bug, but for us all to win we really could be doing more. Crypto art will play a big role in moving us all forward and we are very lucky to have Vesa. Enjoy the video and subscribe to see more in the coming weeks.