Yuri Pattison
Through multimedia installations, Yuri Pattison (1986, Dublin) subverts the tech industry’s mechanisms to highlight its economic, societal and affective impact on human lives. Pattison’s video the ideal (v/0.3.2) (2015–21) features footage from a Bitcoin mine run by Beijing-based start-up HaoBTC on the edge of the range of the Himalayas near Kongyuxiang, Sichuan, China. Filmed by Eric Mu (former chief marketing officer at HaoBTC), the video contrasts scenes of warehouses full of Bitcoin mining rigs and the neighbouring hydroelectric dam with views of the surrounding area. Although Bitcoin is a digital currency, the mining process itself – in which powerful processors solve complex mathematical problems – is incredibly energy intensive. This has led companies such as HaoBTC to move their operations to places where hydroelectric power is cheap and plentiful. Pattison’s work considers the human and ecological implications of producing this digital currency. The video plays alongside a Bitcoin mining rig with a water-based cooling system, referencing both hydroelectric power generation and the fluid circulation of digital currency. Both are housed within industrial racking that resembles the shelving used in the Kongyuxiang mine. Pattison’s title refers (ironically) to ‘Ideal Money’, a theoretical notion conceived by the mathematician Josh Nash (1928–2015) to stabilise international currencies.