British Museum acquires collection of portraits drawn by Damien Hirst at breakfast meetings

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Lizzie Thomson29 April 2019

A collection of more than 70 portraits by Damien Hirst, all of which were drawn on restaurant placemats, have been acquired by the British Museum.

All 73 of the artworks feature Hirst’s former business manager Frank Dunphy and were drawn at breakfast business meetings at the Wolseley in Mayfair.

Hirst produced the sketches, known as The Wolseley Drawings, during these morning meetings between 2004-2010, drawing them on the back of the restaurant’s 22cm placemats.

The pieces are sketched in either pen or pencil and many of them are stained with coffee and food from the table at the time. One of them portrays Dunphy as an egg following a debate on whether it was best to open a boiled egg at its pointed or flat end. As a collection, the artworks give a deeper insight into Hirst and Dunphy’s close relationship.

Dunphy donated the sketches to the Cultural Gifts Scheme, which enables UK taxpayers to donate art to benefit the public or nation. In return, these donors receive a tax reduction on a set percentage of the item’s value. They were then allocated to the British Museum.

This is the second time Dunphy has donated via the scheme. Last year, he gave artworks by Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Peter Blake, Rachel Whiteread, Gavin Turk and Michael Craig Martin to Pallant House Gallery in Chichester.

Hartwig Fischer, director of the British Museum, said: “The British Museum is delighted to have acquired such a vivacious group of drawings by Damien Hirst, and we are grateful to the Cultural Gifts Scheme and to Frank Dunphy for making it possible.

"The British Museum already has extensive holdings documenting the centuries-old interaction between artists and the art market, and Hirst’s The Wolseley Drawings add a fascinating new chapter to that story.”

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