Excitement was in the air on Thursday afternoon at London’s Newport Street Gallery. But the throngs of visitors chatting excitedly or snapping photos of the display were not the usual art crowd, and this certainly was not a usual art opening.

It was a “community event” to preview the exhibition of “The Currency,” Damien Hirst’s first NFT collection in collaboration with HENI, an international art services business, ahead of the official public opening today at the artist’s gallery. Most of the members of this “community” were “currency holders,” meaning they have participated in Hirst’s experimental project.

The exchange period closed on July 27, with 5,149 “currency holders” choosing to trade their NFTs in for the physical paintings. At the gallery, the paintings that had been collected are replaced in the display with translucent, black-and-white slides of the original spot painting.

As for the remaining works on paper, representing the 4,851 works owned by people who chose to keep the NFT, they will be literally burned by the artist himself during the week of Frieze London. They are thus being shown here for the last time before they vanish into the flames.

Για περισσότερα δες εδώ.