Leading British artist Damien Hirst (b. 1965) has created a new rainbow work to show support for the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) amid the current Coronavirus crisis.
I wanted to do something to pay tribute… The rainbow is a sign of hope...
The work, titled Butterfly Rainbow, is made up of bands of coloured butterfly wings – one of the artist’s best-known motifs. It can be downloaded from Damien Hirst’s website and displayed in people’s windows to show their support and appreciation for NHS staff.
From early on, mortality, as demonstrated by his work with butterflies, has been an obsessive theme of the critically-acclaimed artist. He is fascinated by butterflies’ incredibly brief, colourful lives, and is known to knit the coloured patterns of butterfly wings into symmetrical stained glass-like arrangements.
See also: Damien Hirst Revealed to Have Donated Portrait of the Queen to Government
Damien Hirst said: “I wanted to do something to pay tribute to the wonderful work NHS staff are doing in hospitals around the country. The rainbow is a sign of hope and I think it is brilliant that parents and children are creating their own version and putting them up in the windows of their homes.”
A limited edition of the work is also being produced which will be sold with all profits donated to the NHS. Further details will be announced on Damien Hirst’s Instagram.
All across the UK, people have been showing their support for frontline NHS staff and key workers as they deal with the deadly virus, both with painted rainbows in windows and communal clapping.
