DECENTRALISED EMBARGO

2022;
EnBW (client of Gazprom Germania) electricity contract, rack case, open frame server including four Nvidia 3090 GPUs, custom water loop, Ethereum Blockchain.

Decentralised Embargo, is a 4-GPU computing-behemoth running on the electricity supplied by a German energy provider (client of Gazprom Germania), known for burning gas supplied from Russia to create and sell electricity. The server mines Ethereum coins, sending them directly to the official cryptocurrency wallet of the Ukrainian State. Thus highlighting the hypocrisy of a central European economy, where both Russian military actions and the resisting them Ukrainian military are being funded at the same time.

The gallery in Berlin, where the installation was initially exhibited in May 2022, was requested by the artist to sign an electricity supply contract with the energy provider EnBW. The company is known for being a client of Gazprom Germania, a daughter company of a major Russian state-owned multinational energy corporation ranked as the largest publicly listed natural gas company in the world. EnBW generates electricity for the German market by burning Russian fossil fuels. This electricity is then supplied to a powerful computing server set up by the artist as part of his exhibition in the Berlin-based gallery. Custom-assembled hardware components perform the energy-consuming algorithmic process of validating blocks on the Ethereum blockchain, a so-called cryptocurrency mining operation, throughout the entire duration of the exhibition.

This network participation is rewarded with Ethereum tokens, tradable at their market price. While the machine is mining, these tokens are being transferred to the official Ethereum wallet address for donations to the government of Ukraine, an invaded country at war. Via this chain of events, the installation suggests a strategic diversion at perhaps the largest issue within the European economies today - dependence on Russian fossil fuels as an infrastructural necessity despite the apparent misalliance with Russian outward politics, its agenda regarding Ukraine's political inclination towards Europe, and the resulting atrocious armed conflict.