Loyalty

Damien Hirst, The Virtues Series. H9-7, titled "Loyalty". Hand signed and numbered, this work is a Laminated Giclée print on aluminum composite panel, 47.25 x 38 inches and ready to hang. The work is part of a series of nine different works.

Loyalty to a superior was the most distinctive virtue during feudalism. Inazō Nitobe asserts that bushidō Loyalty is unlike its Western counterparts in that the interest of the family and its members are one and the same. Bushidō also conceives of the state as existing before the individual and therefore the individual is born to the state. As such, he exists to live and die for the state or ‘the incumbent of its legitimate authority’.

Damien Hirst is a British artist whose name has become synonymous with contemporary art. Since his generative work as a student at Goldsmiths School of Art, Hirst’s production has been boundary‐redefining in nature. Working primarily in installation, painting, sculpture and drawing, Hirst explores the complex relationships between art, beauty, religion, science, life and death. He constantly returns to his foundational interests and themes, which he reworks to develop an innovative visual language. Hirst consequently produces works which extract wide‐ranging visceral reactions from viewers, triggering fears of mortality, leaving them awe‐struck by beauty and inciting child‐like joy.