![]() These creatures are not already dead like his other specimens, but living and trapped inside a white-walled room. I, like many others, found the work distasteful. This theme continues in the installation In and Out of Love ’91, possibly the most controversial work of the whole show. In A Thousand Years ’90, a symbolic sculptural piece expressing the nature of the life cycle, Hirst manages to create a poignant visual language which references the Vanitas movement whilst placing his work within the modernist, technological zeitgeist. Had Hirst followed tradition and produced gloomy oil paintings containing these connotations of mortality (see Pieter Claesz) his work would not have broken boundaries and become so representative of modern British art. Vanitas symbolism is explicit in Hirst’s works skulls, butterflies, decay, but depicted in a unique way. Earlier works, such as Away from the Flock ’94, evoke the spirit of a young Hirst searching for meaning and using his own place in the cosmos to ask those very same questions he had seen tackled in countless works of art throughout history. Maybe the lead artist should take the main credit, for the concept and design, then the team receive listed credits and a share of the royalties.Īs everyone must now know (unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past 20 years) Hirst’s work is strongly themed around the life cycle birth, death and mortality. What is wrong about it is that the other artists in the team are not credited for their contributing work. So how about the much-discussed fact that a lot of these pictures are produced by assistants in his studio? Well, so what? Leonardo did it, Michelangelo did it, blah blah blah. To decipher the message he was trying to portray through the choice of medicines in each cabinet and on each spot-covered canvas seemed just too much like hard work. I don’t dislike the paintings, although I found them rather tiresome after the third or fourth piece, a feeling which also covers my response to his Medicine Cabinets ’89. My head was full of Saatchi and Sewell and Guardian Arts. ![]() Too much has been said and written about them already. Having grown up in the 90s, the spots are, to me, synonymous with modern British art and to look at them objectively and try to provoke a response was surprisingly onerous. Making my way around the controversial Tate retrospective, I found the legendary Spot Paintings difficult to deal with. ![]() ![]() Remarkably, people seem genuinely offended, as if our very nation has somehow been tarnished by this so-called ‘charlatan’. Not half as many column inches have been written about arms dealers who make billions from selling weapons to violent dictatorships, yet somehow people see that as less of an affront than Hirst whipping off spot paintings ten to the dozen. So if Hirst’s works are not Art and not worth anything, then surely it’s the market who’s the fool in this situation? I’m not sure how that is more Damien Hirst’s fault than any other artist. The industry is responsible for germinating the notion that the more grossly overpriced a work is, the more worthy it must be – a fallacy which fills my bones with anger and disgust. The nature of the art market is for as much money to change hands as possible, in order to invest for a higher sale in the future. I find the witchhunt against Damien Hirst odd in its singling out of just one man. I Am Become Death, Shatterer of Worlds ’06 ![]()
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