Street artist drawing graffiti earned $1,000 worth of bitcoin

French street artist Pascal Boyart, known as PBOY, is introducing Bitcoin to the art world. Boyart signs his paintings with a QR code, through which people donate Bitcoin for his work.

The term “poor artist” appeared a long time ago. Not every artist is lucky enough to have a wealthy patron who would finance his talent. Even with crowdfunding platforms Ulule and Patreon, many artists still find it difficult to survive. For Boyart, the solution to the problem was bitcoin, the world's most popular cryptocurrency.

Pascal suddenly became famous after an active discussion of one of his works in the bitcoin section of the Reddit website. Many site users were impressed not only by his talent, but also by Bitcoin's involvement in art. In addition to QR codes in his work, Boyart explores topics related to cryptocurrency and decentralization. 

The graffiti that was discussed on Reddit depicted a painting by Rembrandt. Despite his incredible talent, Rembrandt experienced serious financial problems during his life. For debts, he lost his home and many of his paintings. The graffiti shows Rembrandt reading a newspaper, although the artist lived in the 17th century.

"The first time I put a QR code in place of my signature was in November 2017. The painting was of a child asking "Daddy, what is money?" I wasn't sure if anyone had done this before, but I wanted to see if people would donate to street art. I did it in honor of the book by Andreas Antonopoulos “The Internet of Money,” says PBOY about his experience.

Boyart earned approximately 0.11 bitcoin (about $1,000) this way. The artist considers himself a cryptocurrency enthusiast and says that creativity will benefit from decentralization.