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Artist Damien Hirst’s paintings linked to his popular non-fungible token (NFT) project were actually created later than the claimed year of 2016, The Guardian reported.
The project, dubbed “The Currency,” involved the creation of 10,000 paintings featuring colorful microdots, with the unique aspect that “no color is repeated twice in any of the artworks.” Each piece included a date and Hirst’s signature, and each painting was tied to a corresponding NFT.
In 2021, these NFTs were sold for $2,000 each via art seller Heni, totaling approximately €17 million.
Buyers of these NFTs had one year to decide between keeping the digital NFT or the physical artwork. Whichever option was chosen, the other was destroyed. The deadline for this decision was July 2022.
In October 2022, Hirst made news by burning 1,000 physical paintings, reportedly worth “millions of dollars,” to leave only their NFT versions.
Throughout the project, Hirst repeatedly stated that the artworks were produced in 2016. However, sources directly involved in the creation process told The Guardian that many of the artworks — at least 1,000, and possibly several thousand — were actually mass-produced in 2018 and 2019.
Hirst’s company has denied any intent to mislead buyers, stating that his “usual practice” is to date physical works by the date of conception rather than the actual creation date. However, the company did not explicitly deny that some works were made after 2016.
This is not the first time The Guardian has accused Hirst of misleadingly dating his art. In March, the newspaper reported that three major artworks, suggested to be from the 1990s, were actually created in 2017.
It remains uncertain whether Hirst intentionally assigned earlier dates to his artworks to increase their perceived value. However, this practice is not uncommon in the art world. There have been several high-profile cases where artists, dealers, or collectors have been found to falsify information about artworks, including their dates.
Artworks created in earlier periods are often perceived as more valuable due to their historical context. If the art market believes that a piece is from a highly regarded period in an artist’s career, it might fetch a higher price. This perceived rarity and historical significance can drive up the demand and value of both the physical artwork and its corresponding NFT.
