Off-Chain Challenges
The story of one man’s journey of selling the first physical/digital Rare Pepe art on ebay.
On December 22, 2023 the artist known as Darky© — a full time digital illustrator, graphic designer, professional tattoo artist, and meme maker got the idea to “pepefy” his 420L trash bin that had been sitting outside his shop for the past 10 years. He started teasing the project by posting this image of spray paint on his official Twitter account with the text “We used to get arrested… Now we get paid for using these…”
This is the bin before it was defiled
Later that day, we got to see the aftermath of the paintjob
And the final product (along with a 5L interior bin)
We also got to see the digital piece that would accompany the physical one.
Three were minted on Tezos (the blockchain of choice for many influential trash artists). One was destroyed (as a sacrifice to the trash gods), one was donated to the online Trashart Museum, and the third was to accompany the physical bin (more on that later). The proof of burn and transfer can be found here.
By the 23rd of December, the large bin was listed for sale on ebay.co.uk and it quickly received a bid of £420.
For some reason, the buyer backed out after the auction closed. I have a feeling that he will regret this decision when he learns about the artist and all the value of his other artworks. But without hesitation, Darky created a second listing — this time for a 5L Sharps bin. The long term plan is to sell 13 of these 5L bins each uniquely hand painted.
When Darky told me about this new listing, I immediately dusted off my ebay username and password from 2016 and bought it. And because the first auction buyer failed to pay, I became the first buyer of a physical/digital Fake Rare Pepe online. We took to Twitter to inform the man who is widely credited as starting the Digital Trash Art Movement — Robness and he did us the kindness of bringing attention to it.
Included with the purchase of the physical sharps bin was a digital token which acts as a proof of purchase. How is this done you may ask? By creating a bitcoin paper wallet and sending the token to it. Of course a plain piece of paper wouldn’t do.
With my purchase finalized, the discussion turned to delivery. Sure I could have it shipped to me and it would end up on my doorstep a few day later, but that’s unoriginal and boring. My family and I had a trip to France booked for Dec. 29, 2023 — Jan. 8, 2024. Knowing Darky lived in that part of the world, I jokingly said something like “why don’t you hand deliver it to me.” Well, Darky is an extremely hard-working artist who will do just about anything for his craft. Not to mention, he loves a side quest. He had already closed his tattoo shop for the holiday season and said, “I will see you in Paris.” I was floored.
The plan was for Darky to arrive in Paris on January 1st because my family and I were leaving on Jan. 2nd for Lyon. The journey was to include a bus, a train, and a flight.
Darky set out at 4 AM on January 1st for the airport. He made it through security, but not before the agents questioned him about the sharps bin. He tried to explain that it was an art piece but they were not having it. They required Darky to secure the lid to the bin or have it confiscated. Little did he know this would turn out to be the least of his problems. At around 7 AM I got a Telegram message from Darky that said, “can I call you — it’s urgent.” I got him on the phone and he told me what the problem was. When he scanned his passport at the entrance to the jetway, the agent stopped him and informed him that he would not be leaving the country! It turned out that his passport expires on February 24th. The airline’s policy was that no one could travel outside the country if their passport expires less than 90 days from the date of the flight. How he got past security and was only a one minute walk to the plane when he was stopped is anyone's guess.
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Darky was devastated. Countless hours and dollars had been now been wasted. Just before I had called Darky, he told me he was on the phone with his wife. After telling her the story she said, “you’re not going to let this go, are you.” She obviously knows him very well. Not 30 minutes after hanging up the phone, I got a message from him with the word “sorted” and this image.
While still at the airport, Darky scheduled an appointment to obtain an emergency passport extension! This was going to require more time and money. The new year was starting off on the wrong foot, but Darky was undeterred. He is one of the most positive people I have ever met. On January 3rd, as my family and I got off the train in Lyon, I messaged Darky to ask he made it to the passport office. He replied with just an image. It took me a second to notice the bin. When I saw it I lol’d.
He then started sending me shots of my bin with random people and in random places.
It was at this point that I realized that this whole thing has been turned in to performance art, and it was masterful. With a brand new passport in hand, a second flight was booked. This time for Nice, France — the final destination of my family vacation.
To get to the airport, Darky needed an Uber. Of course he would choose a meemable pick-up time. Remember — it’s art.
Darky arrived in Nice before we did, and he immediately set out to capture images of the city. This is part of his process — he sees new things and gets inspired. He told me that he can see the image he wants to create in his mind before he even puts pen to paper (or tablet). Once I got settled, we found a spot for lunch. I promised Darky that if he made it I would buy him the biggest plate of fish and chips I could find, and I made good on that promise. He got to meet my family, I gave him a book I wrote about his art on Counterparty and he handed over the bin. But not before shaking it and exclaiming “problematic.” Next we took some “medicine,” said goodbye to my family and set out on an epic walking tour of the city that lasted into the wee hours of the night. All the while, we were looking for good places to photograph our little friend. Here are the results.
We went our separate ways for the evening and reconvened in the morning for a bite to eat at a small café. After that we walked over to the Metro and said our goodbyes.
For me it was just a couple button clicks, but for Darky — it was many many hours of work from painting the bin, photographing it, creating digital art of it, creating a paper wallet, sending a token to it, booking cars, trains, and flights, filling out paperwork, and on and on. This was an experience that I will never forget and it all began with a chance meeting we had in New York last April. To Darky I say, “that’s very pepe of you.”
