Damien Hirst livestreams the burning of $10 million worth of art as part of his NFT project
The Currency is the name given to Hirst's NFT project, which examines the value of digital art versus physical art
Britain's richest living artist, Damien Hirst, has started setting fire to millions of dollars of his own artwork as part of his non-fungible token (NFT) project called "The Currency." .
During an October 11 livestream at his London gallery at 12:30pm local time, Hirst burned hundreds of his own artworks from The Currency, ensuring that they only exist in NFT form going forward.
The Currency is the name of Hirst's first NFT collection, which went on sale last year, made up of 10,000 NFTs, each linked to a physical oil painting.
The project has been part of Hirst's social experiment testing the value of purely digital art versus physical art.
Collectors who had purchased one of the $2,000 NFTs had a year to decide whether to keep the NFT or trade it for the physical painting.
In July, the deadline to decide was met, and 5,149 paintings will be delivered as physical works of art, and 4,851 paintings will only exist in digital format.
Asked how burning the artwork felt, Hirst said: "It feels good, better than I expected," according to a BBC report.
The remaining oil paintings will continue to burn at the Newport Street Gallery until The Currency exhibition closes on September 30.