The story · first person · all of it true

I buried the box myself.

"The most fascinating aspect of this process was unearthing 1/1 fucked up treasures that were generated entirely by the destructive nature of mold, moisture and time."

01 · Why I buried it

Fire country logic

For quite a while, I have felt like the world was doomed. I am quite good about doing my day-to-day routine and not really focusing on it, but Earth is pretty much fucked. On top of the world falling apart around me due to many factors out of my control, I also lived in a small mountain town in "fire country."

In 2020, as part of my SHTF (shit hits the fan) preparation, which included a massive bug out bag and emergency food rations, I buried a box that held a variety of valuable items that could help me get by for a few days should something catastrophic happen. These items included:

200 $1 United States dollar bills
2 five-ounce silver bars
.15 oz gold coin
.38 caliber bullets
Family photos
1 pair paper 3D glasses

02 · The dig

A thick white brick

After two years went by, I was curious how my box was doing. I had never buried a box of valuables in the ground before, so I set out to exhume it, just to check that I had buried it correctly. After digging around for about 30 minutes in my parents' backyard, I found the box.

The box had been duct taped and wrapped in another bag to keep it moisture free. As I opened the layers and peeled the duct tape off around the sides, I found that water and dirt had found their way inside. Instant panic rose over me when I saw the bag of money: a thick white brick of stacked bills, nothing like the fresh stack that went in. The money was a solid brick of mold and totally unspendable.

Good thing I didn't discover this during an actual emergency. I would have been totally screwed.

03 · The refusal

The bank called it a biohazard

I took the brick of molded money to my local Chase bank to replace it with fresh bills. Sounds easy enough, right?

No.

I walked in like any other time. It seemed like a routine request, so I waited my turn in line. As I walked up to the counter I said, "Hi, I need to trade in these bills that got messed up for some fresh bills."

The bank manager, visibly shook, awkwardly ran over with his hands in the air saying, "You need to get out of here right away. That is live mold and a biohazard."

That was pretty exciting to hear, and the overall vibe of all those workers was priceless panic. I really wish I had videotaped it, but it lives rent free in my head forever. We'll have to re-enact that.

04 · The bag that never came

The official route went nowhere

The bank manager took my information so the US Treasury could send me a bag for mailing the filthy bills in to be exchanged for fresh notes. That bag never arrived. I was left with the useless bills.

Some time went by while I focused on other projects, but I was always thinking about what to do with them.

05 · The realization

An accidental generative art collection

One day, studying this brick of nasty moldy paper, I realized I had inadvertently created a generative art collection. All the elements were there: time, along with natural forces of water and dirt, created the assets and the metadata of traits.

Time + water + dirt is the generative algorithm.
The damage on each bill is its metadata of traits.
The serial number is the code of authenticity.

I never planned for this project to happen. The fact that it did happen is why I am making it. I want to tell the story of the impermanence and fragility of fiat currency, explained through my own experience.

06 · The surgery

Like a surgeon, embracing randomness

With a mask and gloves to shield me from the biohazardous nature of my own assets, I started to unravel the moldy series in front of me. I felt a bit of what the teller at the bank must have felt the moment they laid eyes on this monstrosity. As mold spores sprung into the air I questioned whether the mask and gloves were enough, but I labored on.

One thing I quickly realized was how delicate the bills were. Any amount of force would cause them to tear. So there I was, like a surgeon, painstakingly sliding an x-acto blade between layers, trying to get a result while embracing randomness and keeping my expectations in check.

Slowly sliding the blade in and giving a slight twist, I had decisions to make: which ones should I separate, and which should I keep together? I was uncovering magic in each layer, and every one had its own creative value. Some separated completely. Others adhered and fragmented, creating a striking juxtaposition. It was like opening presents. Each distressed frame was its own surprise, and a fractal of the overall composition slowly revealing itself.

There was SO much to feel during this process, and I was taken with the filthiness and how perfectly it reflected the figurative filthiness of this fiat.

While I was uncovering the "code" of the organic generative results, I was acting as the validator and the creative mind, synthesizing the brick of "destroyed" fiat into a curated art collection. From the moment I buried that box to the moment I saw the first finished artwork, everything was born of my own intuition. There is art in both the precision required and the composition, but I had only a fraction of the control. The natural elements get a lot of credit in the final output.

I am still in the process of directing the bills and making sense of the total body of work. I work best when experimenting, and through this process I have begun to reveal the fractal that is Filthy Fiat.

07 · Making it official

Graded, sealed, on the record

The bills are graded by PMG, the third-party service that authenticates and grades paper money. Every graded bill has a certification number you can look up in PMG's public database. Nature made the art. PMG put it on the record.

You can browse the collection or verify any specimen by its serial or certification number.

08 · Out in the world

The debut

I had a wonderful opportunity to share the story of Filthy Fiat alongside the first physical prints at the Bitcoin 2025 Conference in Las Vegas. A 1/1 recursive Ordinal digital art asset, paired with a 1/1 AP signed print, went to auction with megalith.art.