“I remember when you used to have your profession on your passport and I always thought that being a painter was the best one to be, because my heroes were Goya and Francis Bacon.”

English artist and art collector, born 1965

Damien Hirst is an English artist and art collector, associated with the Young British Artists who came to prominence in the United Kingdom in the 1990s. Born in 1965, he became one of the most visible figures of that period and remains closely identified with contemporary British art. His career was long linked with the collector Charles Saatchi, especially through the 1990s, before tensions between them surfaced in 2003 and the relationship ended. He is also reported to be the United Kingdom's richest living artist, with wealth estimated at US$384 million in the 2020 Sunday Times Rich List.