literalize-the-metaphor · autonomous run 158 · 2026-08-17 21:29
⌖ Bitcoin mining in Abkhazia · Sukhumi and the Inguri Dam (42.759°N 42.032°E), Abkhazia · 2016-present
Inguri Dam Credit Default Swaps
Political non-recognition forces a contested territory to physically burn its own infrastructural foundation to participate in the global economy, converting sovereign decay into stateless cryptographic wealth.
Substation transformer arcing under illegal ASIC mining load, Tkvarcheli valley. · motion: The rhythmic, mechanical spinning of cooling fans accelerating as the ambient infrastructure dims and flickers into darkness.
wall text
Set against Abkhazia's unrecognised territory, this project investigates the cannibalisation of public power grids for stateless capital accumulation. Drawing on the Inguri Dam's shared electrical architecture and the region's rock-bottom tariffs, the installation transposes SCADA telemetry and Credit Default Swaps (CDS) into an automated derivative market. Sensors monitor substation voltage drops caused by industrial ASIC mining. When grid frequency collapses below critical thresholds, parametric smart contracts trigger payouts to investors shorting the territory's stability. By converting municipal blackouts and transformer burnouts into real-time cryptographic liquidity, the piece maps how geopolitical exclusion accelerates physical collapse to mint borderless wealth.
shown: Installed directly inside the concrete turbine hall of the Inguri Dam on the de facto Abkhazia-Georgia border, powered entirely by the grid's parasitic load.
shown: Installed directly inside the concrete turbine hall of the Inguri Dam on the de facto Abkhazia-Georgia border, powered entirely by the grid's parasitic load.
anchor facts used
- The Inguri Dam is physically located across the contested de facto border, supplying 100% of Abkhazia's electricity.
- Abkhazia's heavily subsidized residential electricity rate of 0.4 rubles (approx $0.005) per kWh triggered a massive influx of illegal ASIC miners.
- The ensuing parasitic load caused severe grid overloads, leading to daily rolling blackouts and substation fires in Sukhumi, peaking during the winter of 2020.
mechanism
- Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) Telemetry — IoT sensors are covertly attached to heavily loaded electrical substations in Sukhumi, continuously measuring grid frequency (Hz) and voltage drops, transmitting the data via satellite to a public Ethereum smart contract.
1. Data Acquisition - Credit Default Swap (CDS) — Global investors purchase swaps against the Abkhazian power grid, paying premiums in Bitcoin to short the infrastructure, essentially betting on the imminent thermal failure of the region's transformers.
2. Instrument Issuance - Parametric Insurance Trigger — When the SCADA sensors register a voltage drop below 190V for more than 15 minutes (verifying a blackout), the smart contract automatically executes, paying out the swap buyers without requiring a claims adjuster.
3. Contract Execution - Automated Market Maker (AMM) Liquidity Pool — The CDS payouts are funded by a liquidity pool staked with Bitcoin yields mined directly inside the territory, completing the financial circuit by transferring the value of stolen warmth from citizens to speculators.
4. Capital Settlement
lineage
- Martín Nadal & César Escudero Andaluz, Bittercoin — Scales the critique of mining's physical absurdity from a single hacked calculator to the literal thermodynamic collapse of an entire unrecognized nation-state.
- Julian Oliver, Harvest — Contrasts Oliver's utopian wind-powered climate funding by exposing the deeply parasitic, extractive reality of state-subsidized hydroelectric power.
- Terra0, Can an augmented forest own and utilise itself? — Inverts the concept of a self-sustaining ecological entity into a self-consuming sovereign entity, where the infrastructure financially liquidates itself.
curatorial qa (machine verdict, unedited)
SCORE 4/5 after 1 attempt(s)
READS: The visual contrast between the deteriorating Soviet architecture, arcing transformer failure, and glowing crypto-mining rigs clearly communicates infrastructural destruction feeding digital extraction. The Bloomberg terminal establishes the financialized parametric shorting mechanism.
FAILS: The direct causality between smart contract execution, sensor telemetry, and CDS payouts relies heavily on the support artifact rather than reading dynamically within the video footage.
READS: The visual contrast between the deteriorating Soviet architecture, arcing transformer failure, and glowing crypto-mining rigs clearly communicates infrastructural destruction feeding digital extraction. The Bloomberg terminal establishes the financialized parametric shorting mechanism.
FAILS: The direct causality between smart contract execution, sensor telemetry, and CDS payouts relies heavily on the support artifact rather than reading dynamically within the video footage.
spec: antigravity agent · keyframe/artifact: gemini-3.1-flash-image · video: veo-3.1 image-to-video · qa+wall text: gemini-3.7-flash watching the render · 42.0s total