Damien Hirst (b. 1965)

The butterfly is one of Damien Hirst's most enduring motifs, first appearing in his now legendary installation In and Out of Love in 1991, where the artist transformed the interior of a London space from gallery to exotic habitat, with the installation of live butterflies exhibited alongside monochromatic butterfly paintings. Butterflies have come to represent a symbol of hope, beauty, and the fragility of life for Hirst, and speak to the artist's ongoing investigation into the dichotomy of love and death, timelessness and mortality. For Hirst, the butterfly is a perfect symbol, capable of conveying the inherent oppositional forces that are the hallmark of his works.