Bitcoin IRL: Here Are All the Real-Life Tributes to Satoshi Nakamoto's Invention

Because of Bitcoin’s nebulous, digital nature, people often find it difficult to grasp what it is, how it works, and why people use it as a store of value and currency—rather than just accept the regular money most people use.

Artists over the years have explored ways of showing the significance of its ones and zeros in a physical form. Some of the tributes have been permanent and others were temporary. Let’s take a look at these various monuments, made by artists and hobbyists from around the world.

At a park in Budapest, Hungary there’s a bust of Bitcoin’s mysterious creator, known only as Satoshi Nakamoto. Nakamoto stopped posting under the pseudonym shortly after releasing the Bitcoin software. No one knows his or her true identity.

The Nakamoto bust, unveiled in 2021, is shrouded in a hoodie. The face is composed of a bronze-aluminum composite, a material that acts as a kind of mirror, so that whoever stands in front of the bust sees their own face, the Statue of Satoshi website explains. This mirror is a subtle nod to “We are all Satoshi,” a common refrain in the Bitcoin world, highlighting that the digital currency is now in the hands of the decentralized community, since Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared.

In 2018, mathematical artist Nelson Saiers, who’s known for his artistic cultural commentaries, raised a humorous inflatable rat on Wall Street dedicated to Bitcoin.

The “Bitcoin rat” was placed right in front of The Federal Reserve Bank of New York Building. The Federal Reserve is the powerful financial institution in the US tasked with managing the country’s money supply.

Saiers posed the question: Could Bitcoin — an underdog in financial circles akin to a rat covered from head to toe in math equations — one day overtake the existing financial system?  "Warren Buffett called Bitcoin 'rat poison squared' but if the Fed's a rat, then maybe rat poison is a good thing," Saiers told CoinDesk at the time.

A large, stone sphere erected in Yekaterinburg, Russia, at least at one point had the Bitcoin symbol painted on it.

The subject of the looming sphere has been altered many times over the years, depending on the culture of the time, according to Russia Beyond. The stone sphere has taken the form of an angry bird and a poke ball from Pokemon. And in 2017, “rogue artists” temporarily morphed it into a Bitcoin monument.

A man who goes only by “Bitman” on Twitter has the unique habit of projecting the Bitcoin symbol onto important buildings across Europe.

One evening, he projected the symbol on the European Central Bank (ECB), located in Frankfurt, Germany, for several hours. Like the Federal Reserve, the ECB is one of the most important financial institutions in the world. Onlookers gathered around the building to peer at the symbol. “Even no-coiners, who happened to be there, celebrated the light installations. And that is exactly the plan. Bitman wants to show the world the best alternative to the fiat system - BITCOIN,” Bitman writes.

The “Bitman crew” accepts donations for their services, with the goal of educating Europe about the benefits of Bitcoin. Bitman has open sourced his methodology for beaming the Bitcoin symbol onto surfaces, so that others can do it too.

The first-ever Bitcoin monument was erected in 2018 in Kranj, the third-largest city in Slovenia.

According to Reuters, the sculpture is made of three tonnes of metal. It’s ensconced in the middle of a roundabout in the city center. Kranz Mayor Bostjan Trilar told Reuters that the Bitcoin symbol was chosen by popular demand.

The monument was funded by Bitcoin exchange Bitstamp and software company 3fs.