Mystery as Hirst’s son quits £21m family firms
WHEN Damien Hirst made his eldest son, Connor, a director of two of his biggest companies, it looked like the world’s richest artist had found the heir apparent to his estimated £300 million fortune.
But Connor, who is also now an artist, has sparked intrigue by suddenly quitting both roles. ‘It’s a bit of shock,’ a source tells me. A spokesman for Hirst, 57, declines to comment on the reasons for the resignations, confirmed by paperwork filed at Companies House last month.
The documents report that Connor, 27, resigned from both positions on June 23, just over a year after being made a director at art production company Science (UK), as well as at a second business, Prints and Editions.
The companies had a combined turnover of £21.3million, according to the latest figures.
Connor played a significant role in his father’s career at the age of five when his toy anatomy set was turned into a 20ft bronze model. Hirst was sued for breach of copyright.
Earlier this year, I reported that Science (UK), Hirst’s off-shore parent company which is based in Jersey, had taken money from hard-pressed taxpayers, having claimed £1.31 million from the Covid job retention scheme. That was despite the business making £18.2 million in the pandemic. Turner Prize winner Hirst, famed for preserving dead animals in formaldehyde, employs a factory of assistants who make art which is then sold on to Science (UK). He’s previously said he sees his art as ‘a brand produced in a factory’, that anyone can do. ‘No, I don’t believe in genius,’ he once said. ‘I believe in freedom. I think anyone can do it. Anyone can be like Rembrandt.’
The former enfant terrible of British art lives with his girlfriend Sophie Cannell, who is 28 years his junior, and their three French bulldogs, Pablo, Chapo and Blanco, at his £36million 14-bedroom home in Regent’s Park, London, which even has its own stripper pole.
He was previously in a long-term relationship with fashion designer Maia Norman and they have three sons: Connor, Cassius, 22, and Cyrus, 16.