Robert Alice, artist and creator of the ‘Portraits of a Mind’ project, shares his story on how bitcoin - and to quote Robert – “and its essential ties to the past instead of the perpetuated perception of its radical severance with it,“ was a catalyst for a melting pot of inspiration for his mesmerizing artwork Portraits of a Mind, the crossover from physical art into digital art with non-fungible tokens (NFTs), the intersection of artistry and entrepreneurship…and the joys of life as a triplet!

MoneyNeverSleepsis sponsored by PAT Fintech, the training partner that demystifies fintech and digital finance for financial services professionals.

Robert Alice founded his project in 2018 to promote blockchain culture within the visual arts. The completion of Portraits of a Mind spanned 3.5 years and resulted in a 40-painting work of art. Each of the 40 paintings is the size of a small but circular garage door and each represents one of the first 40 blocks of the bitcoin blockchain.  ‘Block 21’ was recently auctioned at Christie’s and had a guide price of $12,000-15,000, but sold for $131,250 in October 2020.

Each ‘block’ is as intricately crafted as a cuneiform tablet with the original source code of the relevant block carved into paint, with specific numbers on each block embossed in gold. When combined, the gold digits become global map coordinates tied to a location on Earth where a significant event occurred in the 5,000 year history leading up to the creation of bitcoin.

Accompanying each painting is a non-fungible token (NFT) including a digital version of that piece of the artwork. The full story of Portraits of a Mind can be found on Robert Alice’s website.

Episode title inspired by Ten Thousand Hours from Macklemore & Ryan Lewis.

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