Trust Damien Hirst to put a spin on things. In today’s launch of his NFT-based project, entitled “The Currency”, the British artist has devised an ingenious system that calls into question notions of worth and value — and, importantly, makes his buyers declare their colours by presenting them with a choice.
He has created 10,000 unique but almost identical spot paintings, each on an A4 sheet of special paper. The paper is not only signed and numbered in the usual way of multiples, but treated and watermarked, with an embedded hologram and other devices that make each sheet very difficult to copy or forge. Just like a banknote, in fact. Their nickname in the studio is “tenner”.
Each of the physical works corresponds to a non-fungible token, which can be bought, on application, for rather more than a tenner — $2,000 apiece. The NFTs are immediately tradeable, in the usual way. But here’s the special Hirst-devised twist: two months after issue, owners of the NFTs have a choice. You will have to make a decision on whether to keep the NFT or the physical artwork: you can’t keep both. If you decide on the NFT, or fail to make a choice, the corresponding piece of art will be destroyed. If it’s the physical work you choose, the NFT will be deleted from the blockchain.