Damien Hirst – The Currency: Artist starts setting fire to thousands of his spot paintings
Damien Hirst has started burning millions of pounds worth of his art as part of a project testing the value of physical paintings versus digital works – and told Sky News: “Who’s to judge what’s right and wrong and what’s real and not?”
The British artist, who rose to fame in the 1990s – winning the Turner Prize with an installation of a bisected cow and calf in formaldehyde – is setting fire to works created for The Currency, a project launched in July 2021.
With the collection of 10,000 pieces featuring his famous spot prints, collectors were given a choice: take a physical Hirst original (quite a bargain at $2,000) or opt for an NFT digital version.
Given a year to decide, buyers had to make their minds up in July this year. The result? Some 5,149 physical pieces will remain intact, their virtual doppelgangers deleted – while 4,851 NFTs will live on in the digital sphere, their painting equivalents going up in smoke.
Hirst has now started the fire for the unchosen physical pieces, with burning set to continue at his Newport Street Gallery near Vauxhall, south London, over the next few weeks.
He told Sky News he doesn’t see his project as burning his art, rather transforming it – but admitted that with his background firmly in the physical art world, he did need to get to grips with the digital one.
“I’m kind of rooted in the physical world, so I find the digital world more challenging,” he said. “I think this has to be part of the process. To create truly digital artworks is to destroy the physical artwork.”
On the first day of the burning, the smell of torched paper lingers throughout the gallery. All 10,000 paintings are represented here, with the 5,149 works whose owners opted for the physical greyed out.
At the moment, the majority of the other 4,851 are still in place, ready to be burnt, while blank rectangles occupy the spaces of those torched so far. By the end of the month, these will represent almost half.
Why opt for a digital artwork rather than a physical painting to display on your wall?
Kyle Johns, 28, from Cwmbran in south Wales, said he originally thought it was an obvious choice – but as the year went on, he changed his mind.
“I came into it, I was always art. I was going to have art on the wall. But it changed. We were in the community and it was nice. We were all in an [online] group and it’s just been brilliant.
“Over the year, the NFT became appealing. It’s hard to explain. If I try and tell my mum I’ve got a picture of a picture that’s going to be burnt, it doesn’t make sense. But when you think of it as the future, it is an art form, it’s digital – and we all have a phone.
“I’m not taking my wall [out] with me, I’m taking my phone and my NFT collection.”
Hirst says he views The Currency as a work of art in which people participate by buying, holding, selling and exchanging the works. The community, the burning, is all part of the art, part of the experiment.
Many who chose NFTs and resold early on have done well. In September 2021, the buyer of number 2,604, titled Revocation, sold it for $172,239 (£154,313). This was the NFT version. According to Hirst’s book on the project, The Currency has so far generated $89m (£78.9m) in sales.
Mr Johns, whose physical piece will burn later in October, says he may look to sell at some point, but for now he is enjoying the experience.
His joining The Currency led to a charity fundraising event supported by the artist – and he now even has a tattoo of another of Hirst’s famous artworks, the formaldehyde shark.
“For now, it’s about the community,” he said. “I think [the NFTs] are trading at about $7,000 (£6,281) now. We’ll see what happens.”
Read more:
Is setting fire to millions of pounds worth of art a good idea?
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Zaheer Raffeeq, 28, who lives in London, opted to keep a physical Hirst painting – deciding three days before the deadline.
”NFTs are too new for me, whereas having something I can hold – I prefer that,” he said. “I thought it was taking too much of a risk to take the NFT.
“I see why people picked the NFT, because it’s also cool to say that Damien Hirst burnt my piece of art… I think I made the right choice.”
Is he worried he might miss out on a lot of money should the value of the NFTs rise more than the physical pieces?
“I think I would have thought the same thing if I’d had the NFT,” he said.
Once the burning is complete, who knows what will happen to the value of either of the sets, physical or digital? NFTs certainly have their critics – but Hirst says it is not for anyone to judge what others appreciate as art.
“With NFTs, we’re making art for people who haven’t been born yet,” he said. “Who’s to judge what’s right and wrong and what’s real and not?
“The people who aren’t born yet are going to decide what’s going to be remembered and what’s not. We’re just here to try and record today for the people of the future.”
Saoirse Ronan has become one of the Academy Awards’ anomalies after being nominated four times without taking home a statuette.
The American-born Irish star received her first Oscars nod at the age of just 13, when she featured in the best supporting actress category for her role in Atonement.
Since then, despite being shortlisted three times for best actress for Brooklyn, Lady Bird and Little Women, she has never won.
Now, the 30-year-old is set to compete in both the lead and supporting actress categories at the 2025 awards for her new films The Outrun and Steve McQueen’s Blitz.
Saoirse Ronan stars in The Outrun. Pic: StudioCanal UK
If she secures one or both nominations, she would become the youngest actor to receive five, or six, nods.
Directed by Nora Fingscheidt, The Outrun, which is inspired by the life of writer Amy Liptrot, follows a Scottish woman struggling with alcoholism while living in fast-paced London.
In a bid to maintain her sobriety, she returns home to Orkney and finds herself in the process.
“Nora really wanted us to have our input in terms of who these characters were and situations that we would find them in”, Ronan told Sky News.
“We had a script that was written and the structure of it was there, but we were sort of able to fill in the gaps a little bit.”
The Outrun. Pic: StudioCanal UK
The Scottish drama marks the first time Ronan has worked as a producer on a project and she says she took a lot from the experience.
She said: “There is a lot going on behind the scenes that actors are protected from, and sometimes I think it would be valuable for an actor to know the drama that exists when they’re not around.
“I think it might make people behave a little bit better and to know that it is sort of like a domino effect when there’s one thing that’s out of place, it really will affect everything else by you not getting on to a call at a certain time.”
The Outrun. Pic: StudioCanal UK
She said it gave her a new appreciation for the craft.
“It’s very difficult to get an independent movie made and to try and source the money needed to just even pay people is difficult sometimes.
“So, yes, it’s just having an awareness of and the graft involved and that has definitely made me appreciate the movies that I’m on so much more where I am just an actor and I don’t have to worry about any of that stuff at all.”
The film also stars The Lazarus Project’s Paapa Essiedu as her boyfriend Daynin.
Battling with the person she has become, her character Rona returns to the Orkney Islands to try to reconnect with nature.
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The Oscar nominee said sea swimming at a remote location was therapeutic for the cast and crew.
“We finished [shooting] on Papa Westray, where we had to have a micro crew. There’s 90 inhabitants on the whole island.
“We stayed in people’s homes because there’s no hotels or anything like that. We ate together every night. We walked to work like it was a very stripped back experience in terms of filmmaking.
“And I think that was sort of felt like art imitating life a little bit after all the chaos of the beginning of the shoot. To have that at the end was wonderful.”
The Outrun is in cinemas now.
Pop star Lana Del Rey has married her alligator tour guide partner in Louisiana, according to reports.
The singer, 39, and Jeremy Dufrene, 49, are said to have obtained a marriage licence in Lafourche parish on Monday and had their wedding three days later.
Footage obtained by the Daily Mail appears to show Del Rey, whose real name is Elizabeth Woodridge Grant, wearing a white dress where Mr Dufrene works as a tour guide in Des Allemandes, south of New Orleans.
Del Rey has not commented on the reported wedding.
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She met Mr Dufrene in 2019, posting pictures of her on one of his tours with the caption: “Jeremy lemme be captain at Arthur’s Air Boat Tours x.”
Arthur’s Air Boat Tours gives guided tours through the local swamps, where its website says visitors are likely to see “300 species of birds” and “alligators up close and personal”.
Mr Dufrene’s profile page says he previously worked seven days a week at a chemical plant – when he would “shrimp on vacation days”.
“After a little convincing by his family, he got his captain’s licence and started running tours,” it adds.
“Jeremy’s a great airboat captain and loves interacting with wildlife & customers.”
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
The couple were pictured together at Reading and Leeds festival this summer where Del Rey headlined.
She previously dated Scottish singer Barrie-James O’Neill for three years and was last linked to a police officer called Sean Larkin.
Entertainment
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs: Woman accuses rapper of further sexual assault allegations in new lawsuit
Sean “Diddy” Combs was hit with further sexual assault allegations after a woman filed a lawsuit in New York.
In the fresh civil case, the woman – identified by the pseudonym Jane Doe – claims she was repeatedly raped and drugged at the music mogul’s homes and became pregnant after one of the encounters.
It follows a series of similar legal cases brought by women against Combs, 54, who was arrested at a hotel in New York last week on sex trafficking, drug possession and firearms offences.
The latest lawsuit was filed on Friday against Combs, his companies and several associates, and seeks undisclosed damages for physical injuries, severe emotional distress, humiliation, anxiety and other harm.
The woman claims she met Combs abroad in 2020 and that the assaults and harassment continued through to July this year.
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She says she was often coerced and harassed into travelling to Combs’ homes in New York, Los Angeles and Miami and other cities, and during every visit the rapper would make her “perform a show” for him.
In one encounter alleged to have taken place in July 2022, the woman claims she blacked out after being forced to take drugs that included ketamine.
She later allegedly took a pregnancy test and told Combs it was positive. She said an associate of the music producer repeatedly demanded her to get an abortion. The lawsuit states she had a miscarriage.
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Diddy ‘didn’t do these things’ – lawyer
The woman, who is being represented by lawyers Marie Napoli and Joseph Ciaccio, also alleges Combs and his associates tracked her location and monitored her conversations.
She claims Combs discouraged her from working and gave her an “allowance” that he used to control her.
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Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
“No one is above the law. Fame and wealth do not protect Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs from serious allegations of sex trafficking and abuse,” Ms Napoli said in a statement.
Combs has been facing civil allegations including rape, sexual assault, and forced drugging since November 2023.
He has pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking but remains jailed, having been denied bail. His attorney said he is innocent and will fight to clear his name.
A lawyer for Combs did not respond to the allegations made in Friday’s lawsuit when contacted by the Associated Press news agency.
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