A number of Bitcoin murals sprang up around London last week following a visit from a mysterious street artist.
The Spanish man, who goes by the name ‘Street Cyber’, was invited to a Bitcoin conference in London and used the opportunity to do some graffiti.
Bitcoin is a decentralised digital currency that was released by the pseudonymous ‘Satoshi Nakamoto’ in 2008.
According to Street Cyber: “Bitcoin is people’s money. It belongs to everyone and there is no central control.”
In an exclusive interview, Street Cyber spoke to SWLondoner about his work and motivations.
Street Cyber started the murals as a hobby to make the public more aware about Bitcoin.
“I began by creating classes about Bitcoin—when I realised it was hard to explain I looked for a way to make it more easily digestible,” they said.
From there the idea came about to merge Bitcoin with graffiti. He has been in the bitcoin space for eight years now and does the graffiti full time.
“Maybe people don’t understand what they see but subconsciously it has an impact. The work is trying to tackle the issue at its root—the subconscious level,” he said.
On the ‘Make War Unaffordable’ piece, Street Cyber commented: “I changed the original Banksy peace symbol to the bitcoin sign because Bitcoin is an active and peaceful revolution that actually has the power to bring peace and stop corruption, which is the root problem of our financial system today.”
Last month it was announced that the Bank of England aims to launch the digital pound ‘Britcoin’ by the year 2030.
The use of CBDCs (central bank digital currencies) is controversial in some circles as the currency harnesses the power of digital cash under the umbrella of a central authority.
“When this happens I want people to at least realise that an alternative option is there,” said Street Cyber.
Street Cyber is inspired by Banksy but also uses Disney Tropes as these are popular and easily recognisable.
When asked what he wished people knew about Bitcoin, Street Cyber said: “It’s the people’s money, it belongs to everyone—there’s no central control. Bitcoin is the safest of all cryptocurrencies.
“In places like Nigeria people are dependent on Bitcoin and it benefits many people without IDs.”
Street Cyber spray-paints many of his murals but also uses paste-ups which are made of water and soap so they are easily removable and do not cause any damage.
He said he had not encountered any legal obstacles with his work: “Most of my art pieces are done in dedicated places.
“London is a very good place as there are specific areas to do artwork and there are many tourists.”
In response to being asked whether he thought Bitcoin could change the world, Street Cyber said: “I think it already did.”
He hopes to continue making bitcoin art in an effort to raise awareness about the digital currency in a creative way.
More of Street Cyber’s work can be found on Twitter @streetcyber_art.
Featured image credit: Street Cyber
