There’s a scene in the classic Woody Allen movie Hannah and her sisters in which a surly artist lectures a new wealthy client that he doesn’t sell paintings “by the yard” or “to blend into the sofa”. Well, Damien Hirst does.
Enter The Beautiful PaintingsHirst’s latest foray into NFTs that riffs on his famous Rotation Paintings 1990s, where the British artist was dripping paint from the top of a ladder onto rotating canvases. The bright colors endure, but the new works are flat and precise, with the serendipity of motion and gravity entrusted to a generative algorithm. The reasoning behind the name of the series is obvious, Hirst announced on Twitter.
A work generated by The Beautiful Paintings by Damien Hirst. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd.
Potential collectors are directed to a dashboard on HENI, the art and technology company that is currently Hirst’s main digital collaborator, where they can generate their own painting. The menu allows users to select up to 12 colors, one of 25 rotation styles, the blur, and the shape of the canvas (square or round). Those more inclined to relinquish creative control to the Hirst machine can randomize the entire process. And why not? They are all beautiful.
Once users generate a painting, they can have the artwork produced as a physical piece, NFT, or both. The physical works are available in four sizes ranging from 24cm to 100cm in diameter and bear Hirst’s signature scribbled with a paint pen. The price of webs ranges from $1,500 to $6,000, and an NFT minted on the Ethereum blockchain costs $2,000.
A work generated by The Beautiful Paintings by Damien Hirst. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd.
“I’ve always believed that anything done well is art and there are no boundaries,” Hirst said in a statement. “For me, The Beautiful Paintings and the Rotation Paintings are about it. No borders. Art that makes you go, ‘wow!’ And you can get lost in it.
With The Beautiful Paintings, Hirst also shows an appetite for capitalizing on the latest buzzwords of a tech-fueled art moment (machine learning, generative art, NFT).
Machine learning was used to produce the example color names – indigo blue is Blueberry Brûlée, purple is Ego, forest green is Mountain Man – and to produce long nonsensical illustration titles. The algorithm inserts descriptives between the words “Beautiful” and “Painting” to produce titles such as “Beautiful Very Undigested Painting”, “Beautiful Ennobled Painting” or “Beautiful Dear And Welcome Implosion Painting”.
Damien Hirst with The Beautiful Paintings. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates Ltd.
“I wanted to do something purely generative,” added the artist. “Without using paint, canvas, or pencils and paper, I was excited to see if we could do something that generated a beautiful look Rotation Paintings who weren’t in the real world.
Damien Hirst’s beautiful paintings run until April 10 on HENI.
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