Trevor Jones, Creator of The Bitcoin Angel, on Digital Art, Fine Art, and NFTs | Ep. 207

In an exclusive interview with cryptonews.com, Trevor Jones, Creator of the Bitcoin Angel & Renowned Artist, talks about the intersection of fine art and Q.R code paintings, the importance of motifs and crypto references in Trevor’s work, and Castle Party 2023.  

About Trevor Jones

Originally from Canada, Trevor set out in 1996 with a backpack and a taste for adventure. Three years and four continents later, he found himself in Scotland, fell in love with the country and decided to stay.

In 2008 he graduated from Edinburgh University and Edinburgh College of Art with an MA (Hons) in Fine Art and was appointed director of charity Art in Healthcare in Edinburgh.

He went on to teach at Leith School of Art while exhibiting in London, Truro and Edinburgh, staging his first solo exhibition in 2010. Since 2012 he has been experimenting with the potential of QR codes in art and combining AR with traditional oil painting.

In 2015 he co-founded CreativTek Ltd to provide AR services to artists and left Art in Healthcare and teaching to focus on his own art career. He also “hijacked” images in the Royal Scottish Academy and National Gallery of Scotland to showcase his own work, setting up an app to view his paintings in place of Old Masters.

Two years later, he was invited to exhibit AR paintings at the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh and took his first dive into Bitcoin and crypto trading. Since then, he has “hijacked” Edinburgh’s National Portrait Gallery and exhibited crypto-themed work at crypto conferences. In 2021 the open-edition NFT derived from his painting The Bitcoin Angel broke sales record and is now iconic in the NFT world.

He also created The Angel’s Share NFT to accompany the record-breaking $2.3m sale of a cask of Macallan’s whisky and collaborated with rapper Ice Cube.

Trevor Jones gave a wide-ranging exclusive interview which you can see below, and we are happy for you to use it for publication provided there is a credit to www.cryptonews.com.

Highlights Of The Interview

• Introduction to Trevor and his work
• The intersection of fine art and Q.R code paintings 
• AI and art 
• The importance of motifs and references in Trevor’s work
• Creating The Bitcoin Angel NFT
• Castle Party at Stirling Castle in 2022
• Castle Party 2023 – what’s coming and what can we expect?
• Must needs in the studio 
• What’s next for Trevor as an artist?

 

 

 

Full Transcript Of The Interview

Matt Zahab 
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the Cryptonews Podcast. We’re buzzing as always, and I’m super pumped to have a fellow Canadian and incredible artists coming on the show today we have Trevor Jones originally from Canada, set out in 1996 with a backpack and a taste for adventure. Three years four continents later found himself in Scotland fell in love and never left hate to see a good Canadian leave, but a big dub for Scotland. This man has done a little bit of everything in 2015, he Co-Founded CreativTek, and that company provided Air Services to artists and he left art and health care and teaching to focus on his own art career has pretty much hijacked the images in the Royal Scottish Academy and National Gallery of Scotland to showcase his own work. Bunch of AR paintings later a bunch of crazy tech initiatives. And the one and only Bitcoin Angel which sold for a very small amount of money which we’ll get into later a bunch of cool stuff super pumped to have this live on the show, Trevor Jones welcome to show my friend. 

Trevor Jones 
Thank you very much pleasure to be here and great to speak to a fellow Canadian as well. So yeah, looking forward to the conversations. 

Matt Zahab 
Super pumped to have you on man I normally we get right into the sort of the career stuff and all that but like I’m a big travel guy myself, I’d love to start with the good old travel story. 1996 setting out with a backpack. Little bit of adventure here and there. Did you ever think that this would just be like I’m gone never coming back like, give me a couple of your craziest stories from that backpack rip of the world.

Trevor Jones 
Yeah, so I was what 25 I think that was with a friend, a hockey player. He was a professional, semi professional hockey player, and this was in a small town of Vernon where I was living at the time in British Columbia, and it was not a good situation we were out clubbing and he end up getting into a fight and ended up dying and in a sort of bringing the dead so down so quickly. But it was a rough place where I grew up. You know like many small towns in Canada. And I didn’t know I was 25 I was working in building supplies where I was driving forklift, part time waitering you know making ends meet, and I just said like, I need to get the heck out of here and see the world and just find myself and, so I got my passport and jumped on a plane to Australia, and that was in the 1986 and just kept on traveling around. I didn’t think I would be I had a year visa, I end up coming back home after about I think five or six months I got homesick. But then after another five or six months at home, I thought like this is ridiculous. What am I doing here, I need to get out again, and I left to the UK travelled out of the UK ancestry visa, my grandfather was British and came over from the UK. So that kind of set me up to create a base from the UK. I was in London for a while, and then you know decided to go up and see Scotland and it was just the this cold rugged place with a lot of friendly drunk people, and that kind of reminds me a home. So staying and yeah I mean again, I was what early 30s. I was just working and traveling and wasn’t planning on staying for so long. And here I am, what 23 years later. 

Matt Zahab 
What a story. Sorry to hear about your mate by the way, and then on the art side of things, like when you were a young kid, did you always have the sort of artistic sauce to your repertoire? Like someone like me for example, who has you know, not even 1% of my body is artistic. I would kill or do bad things even have 1/100 of your talent. And obviously, you worked your ass off and you put in your, you know, 10s of 1000s of hours. But like did you always have the artistic sort of skill set? Or was that perhaps something that you just acquired later on in life? 

Trevor Jones 
I actually I did you know, I didn’t. There was no artists in my family. I didn’t come from an artist family. My dad was a mechanic you know, mom was a housewife and, so although I did do well at art in school you know, and I took art classes in high school, because it was an easy mark for me not because I was planning on doing that. I love sports as well. You know, I was more interested in basketball and, kind of you know, I didn’t know what I wanted to do when I grew up but it was definitely it wasn’t art that wasn’t was never the goal, but I did have a talent for it. You know I did. I was always kind of top of the class and in my art classes in elementary school and in high school, but it wasn’t until I was 31 ish before I felt like I need to be an artist. So it was a very strange decision to dedicate my life to being an artist at in my 30s. It was yeah, then here I am. 

Matt Zahab 
Yeah, that seems like a little late. What events perhaps in life and again, obviously this is you know, sort of tough to perhaps answer but like were there any specific events or you know, realizations or just anything of the like that made you sort of come up with the current style of like, the classic Trevor Jones style that you have at the moment, like what were your  periods of inspo? Where did those come from? 

Trevor Jones 
That’s a really good question. I still don’t know what my style is, and it’s a difficult thing. I mean, I think artists, you look at successful artists for the most part, and they have a style very recognizable style. Whether they’re digital artists, or painter sculpture or printmaking, whatever, they you have a style, just like a musician you know you’re bound, and you can hear music, a piece by them, and you know, exactly hear that voice. You hear that style. So for me, you see I think, finally after I graduated from Art College in 2008, so I did a five year degree at Emory College of Art and split between the university and college, and it was a couple of years after that, I started painting QR codes which was again, a really ridiculous silly decision to make. Because there was no fly kit at the time I’m thinking like, I am a frickin genius. You know nobody in the world was painting QR codes. I mean, there were a few people. But, you know, it wasn’t really, I didn’t see commercial galleries, anywhere selling QR codes, or tech fuel paintings, and so for me, you know I was I guess naive in the sense that I thought, Okay, this is my big breakthrough moment I’m doing something that nobody else is doing, and I knew that I guess as an artist, I was teaching part time, I had a lot of friends who were exceptionally brilliant, talented artists, I knew I needed to differentiate myself somehow to stand out to be recognized, and as I started to incorporate more technology into traditional painting, the paintings that and my style of painting changed and I guess I was trying to in way like, bang a square peg into a round hole. Because it was the technology was driving my concepts. But the style of you know whether it was built from abstract to landscape to figurative to QR codes to, you know every it was just constantly changing, because I’m trying to, I was trying to, well first off make a living as an artist, you know, I spent six years all together with my education here foundation year, and then the five years at Agra that I was teaching part time was running a small arts charity, but my goal was to somehow crack the code to become a full time painter and, you know I realized that the technology that angle was definitely something I was interested in but it also did separating me from everybody else. But it was trying to vent you have somehow figured out a way that I could create work that I was interested in, but was also something that other people would be interested in as well, and that was the hard part, and that was where the struggle came in. Because it really was about 6 7 8 years of constant rejection, to the point where I was say, at my own exhibitions, commercial galleries weren’t interested in showing my work anymore, they could sell paintings that you had to download an app to your phone and scan it like you know A.R. painting or you know, scan this QR code, or near field communication takes all these different types of things I was experimented with, and it wasn’t until I fell down the Bitcoin Rabbit Hole in 2017. Then it started to make sense now that my vision was to create a series of Crypto-themed paintings, you know that were, in the sense my experience of this crazy, volatile, wacky space with all these amazing characters and, geniuses and, you know I mean, it was just a really amazing time for me, although I did lose all my money into that and 17 18. But at the same time, huge amount of inspiration, and that’s when everything kind of linked up because I’d already been exploring technology for whatever, 6 7 8 years or so, and now I was able to find a theme as a focal point for my ideas and my painting that all kind of came together around you know, traditional painting, art, technology. New themes of innovation and Cryptocurrency and in all the people within that space. So yeah, I mean long story short it was just an ongoing struggle of trying to find some of the that fit with what I was interested in, and then with that kind of incorporation of technology, and so I never really made it back into the traditional art world. Because once things took off for me in 2018 you know, it just made sense to keep working in the space, and then NFTs came about and just kept on going. 

Matt Zahab 
Man, what a story. I love that shit. I got a clip that this is just so cliche, classic 101 like do not give up like you so easily probably could have just one day when your art was not selling at a gallery, you probably could have thrown the towel in and waved the white flag and said, you know what maybe I’ll just go do X, Y, or Zed, and here you are today. I just I love that shit. Fucking fires me up. 

Trevor Jones 
Yeah I mean, between like 2000, probably 2012 to 2018 the amount of times that I would be in the studio thinking like, what the heck am I doing? Like, why am I doing this man, I just actually, I mean, I could still go back and be an artist, as a traditional artist, just paint heal up at night, you know, nice landscapes or city scenes are figurative, find my niche market, my little niche market, continue to work part time at the art school and then these kinds of things. But then you know, I looked at the reality of it, and the long term, and like I said, the number of friends who I had, and people I knew, who were exceptionally gifted painters, and just couldn’t make ends meet. Because the market wasn’t there demand wasn’t there was it? So it’s a tough, very competitive market and conservative in Scotland, and you know I just, I didn’t see myself being an arch charity director for the rest of my life. So it was, you know that Hail Mary pass just to, you know, I’m gonna make this work one way or another through that to Hail Mary but 20,000 times over six years, but eventually it was caught him that you’ve got the testam. 

Matt Zahab 
All you need is one. I love how you’ve sort of changed, not sort of how you totally changed from QR codes over to sort of the whole Bitcoin and Crypto sphere of things. Even just looking at your background behind you, I can see that what the big Wall Street right there like you took so many hidden innuendos and motifs and references into every one you’re not almost all of your artwork, and it’s just like, I also find it so interesting how there’s such a we have this weirdo niche culture and you know in Bitcoin, Crypto and NFTs were like urine, including rocket ships and you know, little Dogecoins here and Wall Street’s and Elon Musk and Satoshi Nakamoto, and 420 Blaze It like it’s just how much fun is it just being able to include all these little motifs and references, and like how do you choose which ones to throw into your art at certain types? 

Trevor Jones 
Yeah, it’s, that’s a good question as well. I mean, you know, at the end of the day, a painter or an artist, a visual artist has to create a piece that makes sense, visually, compositionally, and that’s where it the real skill comes in. It’s deciding what not to put in you know, if you overload something, visually, it just becomes an absolute mess. So the ideas come about whether it’s a series of paintings or one particular painting, and then I start, I use Photoshop a lot to be honest to really kind of look at how I can compose an image in such a way that it makes sense visually, that it’s aesthetically pleasing, and it’s not overloaded with, but at the same time it portrays and conveys the message that I’m trying to say. So yeah, it really is just a constant change and experimenting and moving things around, and that’s why you know, back in the olden days, before computers, artists would just have their sketchbook and just constantly sketching things out and, you know very quick sketches, then they kind of dwell that sketch a bit more into something bigger than that there, but smaller paintings and then eventually developed into the full scale large oil painting. For me, it’s an I think for a lot of artists nowadays it’s a lot of computer work. So you just it’s easier to click and post something on Photoshop. Oh, quick. Yeah. And then that’s exactly I just move things around and start playing with different layers. Until eventually things start to make sense visually, and then there’s like okay, it usually just kind of clicks. It’s very, it’s a lot of fun. But it takes a lot of time to really, finally make sense of all these as visuals in that as a series now and creating a whole story and mythology around these paintings, and it’s been almost well actually, over two years I’ve been working on this piece is like the one behind me it’s as huge as 11 feet by 10 feet by six feet tall. So yeah, with regards to all the different visuals and icons I can order fee and symbolism, it’s just a lot of fun, and this space that we’re in the Cryptospace there’s just so much symbolism and potentials for metaphors and analogies and in all different parts of life, and what we’re doing that it’s just fun creating stories and using visuals to convey that message. 

Matt Zahab 
So cool. I always think back to the famous trade line, it’s like art, we want to be like athletes, and they want to be like us. It’s like artists always get people again, I’m taking the words out of his mouth. But I think like someone like me who’s more of an athlete than an artist and I, like I said I’d kill to be able to do what you do, and it’s just crazy, because I could never even do anything like that. But we got to talk about AI as well Trevor, and I know you’ve been screwing around with AI as well, I follow you on Twitter, that’s got to be a pretty cool tool to just get crazy inspiration, you know, like, you literally type in 30 words, and it spits out exactly what maybe not what you wanted, but at least it gets your reference point, which is pretty darn cool. Like, how have you been playing around with AI? And do you think that AI art will be as big as a lot of people say it’s going to be. 

Trevor Jones 
it’s, for me, it again, it’s just a tool, it’s an amazing tool, at the end of the day, look, you know, my maybe unpopular opinion but, you know based on a lot of years in the art space is that with AI, it really is a tool, and AI isn’t going to supersede painting or push. It will force creatives to think differently, and to work on the idea of the message, the story, you know, anybody now can become an artist in sense by using Midjourney or DALL-E and create something that brand new from the came from essentially almost nothing in a way. But at the end of the day the real true artists have something really important to say, and how they see that is, you know through visuals, and through animation, through music, and all these different things. So you still have to have the ideas and concepts, and so it doesn’t matter what Midjourney can do for you, if you just kind of throw words around and come up with some cool visuals. You know, who cares, but the greatest artists throughout history have always had, they’ve been relevant, they’ve been topical, they’ve been saying something about society at that time whatever it was, and they had an important message, and they developed a unique style that represented that time in history as well, and that they created whether it was you know, the futurists or because in the Cubism were you know, the Impressionists or the realists all these different genres and, styles of an evolution of art. It’s you can’t and this again, AI is just a moment in time, and people will be able to look at the arts has been a lot of the art of the digital or AI art has been created now, whether it’s in three years, or five years or 100 years I look back and go that is the art of 2023. But within all the millions of pieces that get created, there will only be a very small number of artists whose work will transcend all of this and be an important and relevant point for history in this time. So you know, AI is a great tool but it’s how the creator decides to use the tool and the message they say that is important and they will make it good or bad art. 

Matt Zahab 
So true as well. Like when you go to the art gallery, or just when you’re at a museum or whatever, there’s always a story behind every piece like what’s the story going to be behind Matt Zahab making some you know, Golfing Bitcoin Panda, like you know it’s like, oh he was out his computer one day after his podcast with Trevor Jones and decided to listen to DALL-E like it’s got I feel like there’s got to be a little more to that to it. Unless there’s a way to somehow incorporate the story then I could maybe see a little. 

Trevor Jones 
Well that’s a scary thing actually with like ChatGPT, you could literally say okay you write me a story about a great art theme for 2023 In 2000 words, somebody that and then you start taking developing that story, and then you take those and put them into visuals in the Midjourney and next you know, you have a series of artworks created entirely by AI that actually is really good. So that’s quite scary in itself. 

Matt Zahab 
It’s too much fun. Folks gonna take a quick break when we get back we’re going to talk about the exclusive Castle Party at the Stirling Castle and 2022 running back for 2023 it was a banger and we will be jumping into that as well as the Bitcoin Angel one of the most famous NFTs of all time. We have a new sponsor on the show, and I’m super pumped that’s Undeads Metaverse is now sponsoring the Cryptonews Pod. These guys have the ultimate gaming experience with Undeads and is the post apocalyptic world with an above the ground city for humans and underground layers for zombies all powered by the Blockchain. This unique game is designed to blend top level mechanics with play to earn rewards. Developed by an incredible team led by Leo Khan, a former PayPal exec and Ash Hodgetts former CMO of Animoca’s Phantom Galaxies. Undeads Metaverse has over 5 million already invested and is making waves creating an incredible experience for all of their gamers. Undeads has also secured partnerships with top industry players such as Warner Bros. Ever heard of them, Wabi Sabi Sound and many more to come rich gameplay of VR experience and healthy and efficient game economy verified by machinations.io join the conversation at undeads.com and sign up for the whitelist now, and now back to the show with Trevor. Trevor, before we get into the Castle Party, I think we got to go Bitcoin Angel first. That was absolutely insane. Walk me through the whole story, like from the creation of it to the sale of it. Did you ever think that much money would get raised for like just an incredible story, you got to give me the deets on it. 

Trevor Jones 
The Bitcoin Angel painting was created in 2018. During that I started the themes around this Crypto Disruption Exhibition end of 2017 before I even knew if there was going to be a market if there would be anybody interested in Crypto-themed paintings. I had hired a gallery here in Edinburgh to for a week or 10 days just to knowing that I wouldn’t sell any of the work that it was just an opportunity to kind of take photos and put it on social media and just kind of hanging out in the gallery with my paintings that nobody wanted here in Edinburgh. In the Bitcoin age was one of them, and that came like I said from that series of paintings that represented my very early experience in the Crypto scene, and the Bitcoin user representatives I mean a lot of different things. First off at sprinting these 16th century sculptures that in Rome, the FCC trees with the Bitcoin behind so it’s very simple change of status from well painting a three dimensional enormous sculpture 2d and adding the Bitcoin with a golden rays coming down. I had no this was pre NFTs, that it was painted, and I just thought you know that this is going to be a painting and maybe somebody will like it, and then obviously, things changed by first NFT drop was in end of 2019 with a lot of money, and I started to revisit my old Crypto-themed paintings and think like, I could actually digitize these animate them tell a fuller story around your artwork. So the Bitcoin Angel one of one aggravation would drop to think that she was on my birthday March 26 in 2020, and then eventually came around to late or early 2021, and that time things had really started taking off. I’d had my collaboration with Jose Delgado, I had my collaboration with PAC, I had the Eth belief initially, this boy drove with a loader, and I did this from pallet to Canvas exhibition retrospective, I think the first retrospective ever in the Crypto, Cryptos Art Scene, and I decided to do an open edition of the Bitcoin Angel, and it was $777 I had a 777 actually on the digitize artwork itself, and I had no idea what was going to happen. There obviously was a huge shift and had been going on for what needs six or seven months, eight months from the Bitcoin Bowl actually in July of 2020, and things were really kind of taken off for me and the Crypto Art Scene in general. But when it was a seven minute open edition, and I was left with my wife sitting on the couch and all pumped that there’s another I think 14 or 15 one on ones who are gonna be dropping the next day on Nifty Gateway, but this was the open edition this was the big thing and there been a lot of talk about it, but I didn’t wanna get my hopes up and my wife’s gonna like he’ll just put the phone down don’t look she took my phone out my hand, put it in the pillow case zipped it up on the couch and didn’t let me I was like drinking wine like you wouldn’t believe and after like eight minutes or something, you know, say okay, here’s your phone back and I just opened up and looked at the 4,158 editions minted which was absolutely mind blowing and earth shattering and record breaking. So it was worth $3.2 million in seven minutes, and then the next day there’s another million in one on one sold with the physical paintings been sent out to all the winners as well. That was the beginning of some pretty crazy times just trying to deal with the ups and downs and the stress and the good things and the bad things. It’s been a nonstop roller coaster ride ever since. 

Matt Zahab 
What a life changing moment. What was the first word that came out of your mouth or first words when your wifey unzip the pillow? 

Trevor Jones 
It’s probably fuck yourself. 

Matt Zahab 
Just a big F bomb it had to be like, I think you could swear it’s, it’s not a kid friendly show. So I probably would have done a couple of laps around my house, like run around with tears of joy would have definitely been present like that’s a life changing moment. Like, that’s crazy. 

Trevor Jones 
You know the funny thing at the time. I mean, initially it was huge record like yeah, it was that night, I think was probably I can’t remember the exact time would have been maybe like 10 o’clock at night here in Scotland and, you know once it happened that obviously Twitter just went crazy. Crypto Twitter there’s enormous amount of positivity and congratulations. But at the same time, there were of course, there’s always the push back and people were not happy about it, and there was some ideas, we went around that I ruined my career, because it saturated the market. Now, this was kind of the time of one on ones, you know, it open editions had only been around for real maybe kind of taken off for the last couple of months. So the next day I was in two mines I was like, over the moon ecstatic holy crap my whole life has changed. This is really realistic and crazy, and I’ve also ruined my career and I’m not going to have, I don’t know what I’m gonna do, you know, I’ve nobody’s going to want to buy my work because it’s there’s too many, there’s too much of it out there. But what I’ve discovered in this space over this you know, the every, it seems like every three months, something big happens, and things change and tastes change and trends change and what was considered a bad form or not good or something terrible that you shouldn’t do that. Three to six months later, everybody’s doing it, you know, and what the trends change. So, you know, it took a lot of time, and you know there’s been a lot of ups and downs. But I think what I’ve learned is that always stay true to yourself. You don’t know what’s gonna happen. You don’t know how things are going to roll out, you have no idea. But if something big does happen like happened to me and with Bitcoin Angels that you have to, number one take responsibility and accountability, and you have to adapt, and you have to be aware that you’ll have to kind of rethink things and be flexible, and that is a nice segway into the Castle Party because that’s exactly what the Castle Party how it came about. 

Matt Zahab 
Well that’s again, so happy for you man. That’s incredible. I just to tell the listeners who are doubting themselves, just keep hauling ass keep working hard. Keep going to the studio every single day Trevor never left the lab you know, I’m sure there were times you want it to and here we are, and next up we got the Castle Party, which looks like an absolute banger. The Stirling Castle, like when I was doing research for the show. I was like okay, how sick of a castle could this be? This is a legit castle. This isn’t some Disneyland castle. This is like a legit castle from way back in time. You got to walk me through how all of that went down and sort of any if you have any good stories from last year’s event, and perhaps what to look forward to at this year’s event. 

Trevor Jones 
Yeah. So after literally maybe what 8 10 days after the Bitcoin Angels drop, I was talking to I was observing they’re like, what’s going on? How do I make the best of the situation I mean already great situation, but how do I how do I make sure that it’s only positives, and when my big collector said like this was joking around? It’s like, well, he threw a Castle Party, and I thought yeah why not? And without really thinking how much work is going to be but you know, as soon as I put my mind something, and that’s I think part of the thing the reason why I did it is because you know in this is if you do if you say you’re going to do something, you do it, you know that I think having credibility in the space. There’s a lot of rug pulls is a lot of scams, there’s a lot of bad actors, and for the people who are here and who are genuine and legitimate and filled with integrity people recognize that. So doing something big like having a Castle Party and actually pulling it off and putting all the work into it to get it done and to hold it and to have 300 people from 22 different countries flying to Scotland for this party and pull it off. He’ll that I think for me it I mean, it was a huge honor to be able to do that. But also, I think it proves to people that I’m here to stay, you know, this isn’t for me I’m not in and out, I’m not going to make some money and take off that I’m here for the long game. So when I was looking at okay here’s the castle, we need to find a castle, I started looking around Scotland, and different places to look to Edinburgh Castle and what it would cost to hire that and, but then also it was finding a place that could hold a decent amount of people. There’s tons of beautiful castles in Scotland, but he might be able to put 50 or 100 or 120 people in. So Sterling Castle was one of my favorite castles. It’s beautiful inside, outside is huge. We could fit 400 maximum. There’s just so much history there and like he said, it is like castle is like a real castle. You know, and I liked that history that this isn’t a palace. You know, there’s been bloodshed in this castle, there’s been wars in this castle, there’s been a lot of ghosts, and a lot of bad things have happened, and I liked and that’s why I thought oh, if I’m gonna have a party, and you know, inspired by art in the history and culture, I want a castle with a lot of stories to tell. So we hired a number of kind of actor historians that were dressed up they that’s their job, they go there at the castle and they basically talk to visitors from around the world and, and tell them that the history of the castle of Scotland, and they’re brilliant, they’re absolutely amazing. You know very entertaining. So you’re having all these guests come in from all around the world and just really find out the history of the space. But I’d also use augmented reality I’d hidden my artwork all around the castle in different places. So you can scan different banners and tapestries and see my Bitcoin Angel. You know, we had a DJ had open bar, everything you could eat and drink, and it was just an amazing opportunity to bring my supporters together to celebrate the Bitcoin Angel to celebrate the Crypto Space NFTs and to meet IRL and to actually build real friendships through real human interaction. 

Matt Zahab 
It’s crazy how much goes into throwing like a legit party of that day like I don’t know if this is the Bible with you said you were an art director before this. So you’ve definitely thrown your fair share of bangers not charity event. 

Trevor Jones 
No, not like this. 

Matt Zahab 
Not at a castle. Like they’re throwing a party at an event at a conference venue and then they’re storing an event at a castle like there must have been some very weird things that you’ve learned that you know, you wouldn’t probably never expected. 

Trevor Jones 
It was a lot of stress. Because I’d never throw any like this before it got anything like this for it was the unknown so what can go wrong? What will go wrong? What to watch out for? And I’ve got two great guys on my team myself. I was joking after the Castle Party. So you know, I’ve got my enormous team I got 40 guys working for me in the race. I’ve got 40 guy that’s like, you know, I’m joking. I’ve got two guys, it’s me and Martin and David, and they are just amazing to work with, and they really were the brawn behind, the muscle behind, you know, I have the crazy ideas, and they kind of helped me push things through. So having a good team around you is absolutely essential. Even if it’s a very small team. 

Matt Zahab 
You gotta Yeah, of course you got to plug this year’s party give me some dates, tickets whole nine yards, walk me through what’s going on. 

Trevor Jones 
September 3rd to 5th. So yeah, that’s what we learned with the last one is it’s great to have a party, but you need more time, and for me I didn’t have enough time to really talk to people. So we thought let’s have a three day two night event. It gives me more time to hang out and just chat with people another glass of wine and that kind of thing. I was all over the place. So everything like last one. You know, it was like a wedding without the boring parts. But for me it was just literally running around. What scene was crying? You know, they’d sense it was a lot of fun, but I just didn’t get enough time I was like the groom meal and I couldn’t actually talk to people and meet people. So three days, two nights in France, about an hour south of Paris called Renaissance Chateau called their image is called Château de Vallery, and I think it’s a fifth built in 1555. There’s actually a part of it, underground caves, which is medieval, I think 12th century, and that’s a wine cellar we’ll be having wine tastings and they’re all by candlelight. You know, there’s we’ve got we’ll have a couple of DJs we’ll have pool parties with the DJs we’ll have fireworks at night. We’ve got a football five on five or soccer five on five tournament and we’re going to hopefully have a room filled for potentially for poker. We could have like a you know a poker event. 

Matt Zahab 
All the stops here like this is my kind of shaker. 

Trevor Jones 
You gotta come back you’re invited.

Matt Zahab 
I love to, I’m gonna book this off. Trevor what a treat man I know we’re getting tight for times has been so much fun. We always have a hot take we have a segment on the show called the hot take factory where we jump in let a couple of hot takes fly perhaps something you believe in whereas most other people do not. You gotta give me a couple of Trevor Jones hot takes before we go. Can be anything doesn’t have to be like AI or Crypto or art or anything. Any anything in life hot takes. 

Trevor Jones 
Hot takes, gush you know I can’t be controversial because, you know, I can ruin my career. I’ve literally I used to be a lot more you know, will kind of poke the bear on social media on Twitter. But by 2020 I was trying to be people were trying to cancel me. So I now I tend to keep my mouth shut, and my hot take is life is a lot easier and you keep your mouth shut. Put your nose down work hard and try not to offend anybody. I save all my hot takes for that as I first said from my wife. 

Matt Zahab 
Well said. 

Trevor Jones 
Like you go the wrong way but yeah, my wife and I absolutely she just makes me laugh all the time with how politically incorrect she is, and all the things that she says it just you know, absolutely kind of make me roll with laughter. Hot takes I don’t know. I’m sorry Matt, I’m letting you down here. 

Matt Zahab 
Hey Trevor in person I’m sure you’ll let a couple fly when we’re in uncancelable territory. Also, your accent is like it’s too good. You know, you have a bit of a Scottish accent now, right? Like you’ve developed, as I’m sure has anyone ever told you that? 

Trevor Jones 
Yeah. Well, I go back home to my mum was a hey my santos you sound so Scottish like, no I don’t I sound Canadian. Ben when I’m over here, if you feel like you don’t sound Scottish at all. You’re full on Canadian. But it’s I think there are certain things probably comes out a bit more after a couple of years. So if you come to the Castle Party, you had a couple of beers in me and he’ll be like, what did you just say man? 

Matt Zahab 
It flies. Trevs thanks for coming on, man. Before you go, you got to let our listeners know where they can find you and all your endeavors online and on social and as always, I will include everything in the show notes. But you gotta let us know where everyone can find you online and on socials. 

Trevor Jones 
It’s very easy Trevor Jones Art everything so trevorjonesart.com website, @trevorjonesart on Twitter, @trevorjonesart on Instagram. I really only use Twitter and my website to really kind of showcase my work and what I’m doing and Discord and you can find my Discord at on my Twitter bio. That’s pretty much everything you need to know. 

Matt Zahab 
Trev thanks man truly had an absolute blast chatting with you we’d love to have you on for round two and hopefully I will be in beautiful France having a glass of vino with you maybe playing five on five football maybe it’ll poker at the Castle Party. But until next time, thanks again and we will keep in touch. 

Trevor Jones 
My pleasure, Matt. It’s really nice speaking with you. 

Matt Zahab 
Folks what an episode with Trevor Jones. As always do go check him out on Twitter and his website trevorjonesart.com. I love these episodes when it’s a little more non tech related and you know, very personable, as always have so much fun doing this. Huge shout out to Trevor for blessing us with his time. If you guys enjoyed this one, please do subscribe. It would mean the world and to the team. Love you guys as always, to Justas my amazing editor appreciate you and all your hard work back to the listeners love you guys. Keep on growing those bags and keep on staying healthy, wealthy and happy bye for now and we’ll talk soon.