Hirst dot paintings. Damien Hirst in Venice invites you to admire the luxurious treasures of the “Incredible

Damien Hirst(English: Damien Hirst, b. June 7, 1965) is a contemporary English artist. One of the most prominent representatives of the Young British Artists group. Winner of the Turner Prize 1995. Estimates for 2010: the richest artist in the world.

Biography and creativity

Damien Hirst born in 1965 in Bristol (England). Grew up in Leeds. His father left the family when Hearst was 12 years old, and his mother was unable to control her son. In his youth, he was arrested twice for shoplifting.

He studied at art school in Leeds and then (after a two-year pause) at Goldsmiths College (1986-1989), which at that time was considered innovative and offered an experimental training program, which attracted many talented students and teachers. At this time, he was very interested in the work of Francis Bacon, which was reflected in his future works. Even before completing his studies, in July 1988, he curated an exhibition "Freeze", which featured his own installations, among others. It should be noted that this exhibition itself was in many ways the project of the 23-year-old Hirst and marked the beginning of both his own career and the careers of a number of other artists, many of whom were also Goldsmiths graduates. Here Hirst was first noticed by millionaire and art collector Charles Saatchi, who was greatly impressed by the artist’s work. A year later, at Hirst’s second exhibition, he bought his work “A Thousand Years” and offered financial assistance in the creation of future works.

Installation "A Thousand Years" was a kind of system illustrating such global processes as life and death. The theme of death - Hirst's key theme - already occupies a dominant position in this work. The installation consisted of a container with fly eggs, a rotting cow's head and an electric fly swatter. Larvae hatched from the eggs, crawled towards the food (the cow's head), turned into flies and died when they came into contact with the fly swatter. Over time, the installation changed - the head became smaller and smaller, and there were more and more corpses of flies, and the viewer, returning to the exhibition, saw the entire process described above in dynamics, observing not only the life path of the flies, but also the result of this process.

With Saatchi's money, Hirst created a work called “The physical impossibility of death in the consciousness of a living person”. This work was a dead four-meter shark in formaldehyde. It laid the foundation for a number of similar installations, one of which is "Mother and Child Separated"(literally from English) “Mother and child. Divided") – was presented at the Venice Biennale and brought Hirst international fame. Here the viewer sees creatures “frozen in death,” something frightening and repulsive, something that is no longer alive, but still retains its easily recognizable appearance. So, for example, in front of the conventional viewer of the installation “Physical Impossibility...” there is no shark, it has already died and only its shell remains. But the “dead” is perceived by the viewer only as “inanimate”. He sees the “formerly alive,” interpreting the new object through the prism of what it once was, rather than guided by what it is now.

The theme of death, which sometimes turns into the theme of the transience of life, runs like a red thread through all the work of Damien Hirst. In 2007 he created a work called "For the love of the Lord!", which is sometimes called "The Diamond Skull of Damien Hirst" and which became known as the most expensive work of art living author. This piece itself is a copy of the skull of a 35-year-old European man, made of platinum and completely encrusted with diamonds. There is a pink diamond in the center of the skull's forehead. The creation of this work cost Hirst 14 million pounds sterling.

Despite the conceptual foundations of Hirst's works, it is difficult to deny the deliberately scandalous nature of many of the artist's works. Following dead animals in formaldehyde and the most expensive work of art in the world, we should mention the installation "In and Out of Love" or in this case "Inside and Out of Love"). There were chrysalises attached to the canvases on the walls, from which butterflies emerged. Entering the room, the spectators found themselves among these insects, which flew around them, landing both on the spectators themselves and on containers with fruit placed in the same room. The exhibition took place at the Tate Modern gallery and lasted 5 months. During this time, it attracted more than 460,000 visitors and became the most visited solo exhibition in the gallery's history. Later information appeared that 9,000 butterflies died during the exhibition and this caused protests from a number of environmental organizations.

Damien Hirst's paintings can be classified as geometric abstractionism (example: series “Spot paintings”) and (example: series “Spin paintings”)). The “Spots” series consists of paintings that depict circles of the same size, but different in color (the color is never the same), arranged in a lattice shape. The Rotations series consists of paintings that were created by pouring paint onto a rotating canvas. Hirst is also the author of a number of paintings that return us to the theme of butterflies: the Butterfly Color Paintings series consists of works where dead butterflies are attached to still-dry paint, which become the basis of the composition.

There is an opinion that an artist can be either extremely rich or extremely poor. This can be applied to the person who will be discussed in this article. His name is and he is one of the richest living artists.

If you believe the Sunday Times, then according to their estimates, this artist was the richest in the world in 2010, and his fortune was estimated at 215 million pounds sterling.

The works of Damien Hirst

In modern art, this person occupies the role of “the face of death.” This is partly due to the fact that he uses materials that he is not used to using to create works of art. Among them, it is worth noting paintings of dead insects, parts of dead animals in formaldehyde, a skull with real teeth, etc.

His works evoke shock, disgust and delight in people at the same time. Collectors from all over the world are willing to pay huge sums of money for this.

The artist was born in 1965 in a city called Bristol. His father was a mechanic and left the family when his son was 12 years old. Damian's mother worked in a consulting office and was an amateur artist.

The future “face of death” in contemporary art led an asocial lifestyle. He was arrested twice for shoplifting. But despite this, the young creator studied at the Leeds School of Art, and then entered a London college called Goldsmith College.

This establishment was somewhat innovative. The difference from others was that other schools simply accepted students who did not have enough skills to enter a real college, but Goldsmiths College brought together many talented students and teachers. They had their own program, for which you did not need to be able to draw. Recently, this form of training has only gained popularity.

During his student years, he loved to visit the morgue and make sketches there. This place laid the foundation for his future themes of works.

From 1990 to 2000, Damien Hirst had problems with drugs and alcohol. During this time, he managed to commit many different pranks while drunk.

Artist's career ladder

Hirst first became interested in the public at an exhibition called "Freeze", which took place in 1988. At this exhibition, Charles Saatchi drew attention to the work of this artist. This man was a famous tycoon, but, in addition, he was an avid lover of art and collected it. The collector acquired two works by Hirst within a year. After this, Saatchi often purchased works of art from Damien. You can count about 50 works that were purchased by this person.

Already in 1991, the above-mentioned artist decided to hold his own exhibition, which was called In and Out of Love. He did not stop there and held several more exhibitions, one of which was held in

In the same year, his most famous work was produced, it was called “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of the Living.” It was created at the expense of Saatchi. The work done by Damien Hirst, the photo of which is located a little lower, was a container with a large one that was immersed in formaldehyde.

In the photo it may seem that the shark is quite short in length, but in fact it was 4.3 meters.

Scandals

In 1994, at an exhibition curated by Damien Hirst, a scandal occurred with an artist under the name Mark Bridger. This incident happened because of one of the works called “Strayed from the Herd,” which represents a sheep immersed in formaldehyde.

Mark came to the exhibition where this work of art was being shown and in one motion he poured a can of ink into the container and proclaimed the new name of this work - “Black Sheep”. Damien Hirst sued him for vandalism. At the trial, Mark tried to explain to the jury that he simply wanted to complement Hirst’s work, but the court did not understand him and found him guilty. He could not pay the fine, because at that time he was in a poor state, so he was given only 2 years of probation. After some time, he created his own "Black Sheep".

Damien's achievements

In 1995, a significant date occurred in the artist’s life - he was nominated for the Turner Prize. The work entitled “Mother and Child Separated” was the reason why Damien Hirst became the winner of this prize. The artist combined 2 containers in this work. In one of them there was a cow in formaldehyde, and in the second a calf.

The last "loud" work

The most recent work that has caused a stir is one on which Damien Hirst spent quite a lot of money. Damien Hirst has never had a work, the photo of which already shows all its high cost.

The title of this installation is “For the Love of God.” It represents a human skull, which is covered with diamonds. 8601 diamonds were used for this creation. The total size of the stones is 1100 carats. This sculpture is the most expensive of all the artist's. Its price is 50 million pounds sterling. After that, he cast a new skull. This time it was the skull of a baby, which was called "For God's Sake." Platinum and diamonds were used as materials.

In 2009, after Damian Hirst held his exhibition "Requiem", which caused a stormy wave of discontent from critics, he announced that he had given up installations and would henceforth again engage in ordinary painting.

Outlook on life

Based on the interview, the artist calls himself a punk. He says that he is afraid of death, because real death is truly terrible. According to him, it is not death that sells well, but only the fear of death. His views on religion are skeptical.

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Damien Hirst (1965, Bristol, UK) is one of the most valuable living artists and the most prominent figure in the Young British Artists group.

His father was a mechanic and car salesman who left the family when Damien was 12. His mother was a Catholic who worked in a consultancy office and was an amateur artist. She quickly lost control of her son, who was arrested twice for shoplifting. Damien Hirst attended art college in Leeds and studied art at university in London.

Hirst had serious problems with drugs and alcohol for ten years, starting in the early nineties.

Death is a central theme in his works. The artist's most famous series are dead animals in formaldehyde (shark, sheep, cow...)

One of his first works was the installation “A Thousand Years” - a visual demonstration of life and death. In a glass display case, fly larvae emerged from eggs to crawl behind the glass partition to the food - a rotting cow's head. The larvae hatched into flies, which then died on the exposed wires of the “electronic fly swatter.” A visitor could watch "A Thousand Years" today, and then come again a few days later and see how the cow's head has shrunk in the meantime and the pile of dead flies has grown.

At forty, Hirst was worth £100 million, more than Picasso, Warhol and Dali combined at that age.

In 1991, Hirst created “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of the Living” (a tiger shark in an aquarium with formaldehyde)
"I like it when an object symbolizes a feeling. A shark is scary, it's bigger than you and it's in an environment that's unfamiliar to you. Dead it looks like it's alive, and alive it looks like it's dead." Sold for $12 million

Canned sheep cut lengthwise. A creature "frozen in death." Expresses "the joy of life and the inevitability of death." Sold for £2.1 million

"Mother and Child Separated." You can walk between them. In 1995, Hirst received the Turner Prize for it. In 1999 he declined an invitation to represent Britain at the Venice Biennale.

Hirst had a large "medical" series. At a trade show in Mexico City, the president of a vitamin company paid $3 million for "Blood of Christ," an installation of paracetamol tablets in a medical cabinet. "Spring Lullaby" - a cabinet with 6,136 pills arranged on razor blades sold at Christie's for $19.1 million

LSD
Hirst's third major series is "dot paintings" - colored circles on a white background. The master indicated which paints to use, but did not touch the canvas himself. In 2003, his dot pattern was used to calibrate an instrument on the British Beagle spacecraft launched to Mars.

The fourth series - paintings of rotation - are created on a rotating pottery wheel. Hirst stands on a stepladder and throws paint onto a rotating base - canvas or board. Sometimes he commands the assistant: “More red” or “Turpentine”
The paintings "are a visual representation of the energy of the random"

A collage of thousands of individual tropical butterfly wings is created by technicians in a separate studio

An interesting story happened with one reporter who had an old portrait of Stalin hanging, which he had once bought for 200 pounds. In 2007, he approached Christie's with a proposal to put it up for auction. The auction house refused, saying that it does not sell either Stalin or Hitler.
- What if the author was Hirst or Warhol?
- Well then, we would be happy to take him.
The reporter called Hearst and asked him to draw a red nose on Stalin. He did so and added his signature.
Christie sold the work for £140,000

Dominating the art scene since the 1990s.

In the 1980s, Goldsmith College was considered innovative: unlike other schools that accepted students who could not get into a real college, Goldsmith School attracted many talented students and inventive teachers. Goldsmith introduced an innovative program that did not require students to draw or paint. Over the past 30 years, this model of education has become widespread throughout the world.

As a student at the school, Hirst regularly visited the morgue. Later he would notice that many of the themes of his works originated there.

Career

In July 1988, Hirst curated the acclaimed Freeze exhibition in the empty Port of London Authority building in London Docks; The exhibition featured the works of 17 students of the school and his own creation - a composition of cardboard boxes painted with latex paints. The exhibition itself Freeze was also the fruit of Hirst’s creativity. He selected the works himself, ordered the catalog and planned the opening ceremony.

Freeze became the starting point for several artists of the YBA association; In addition, the famous collector and art patron Charles Saatchi drew the attention of Hirst.

Hirst graduated from Goldsmiths College in 1989. In 1990, together with his friend Karl Friedman, he organized another exhibition, Gamble, in a hangar, in an empty building of the Bermondsey plant. Saatchi visited this exhibition: Friedman remembers how he stood with his mouth open in front of Hirst's installation called A Thousand Years - a visual demonstration of life and death. Saatchi purchased this creation and offered Hirst money to create future works.

Thus, with Saatchi’s money, in 1991 the Physical Impossibility of Death in the Consciousness of a Living Person was created, which was an aquarium with a tiger shark, the length of which reached 4.3 meters. The work cost Saatchi £50,000. The shark was caught by an authorized fisherman in Australia and had a price tag of £6,000. As a result, Hirst was nominated for the Turner Prize, which was awarded to Greenville Davey. The shark itself was sold in December 2004 to collector Steve Cohen for $12 million (£6.5 million).

Hirst's first international recognition came to the artist in 1993 at the Venice Biennale. His work "Mother and Child Divided" featured parts of a cow and calf placed in separate aquariums containing formaldehyde. In 1997, the artist’s autobiography “I Want To Spend the Rest of My Life Everywhere, with Everyone, One to One, Always, Forever, Now” was published.

Hirst's latest project, which caused a lot of noise, is a life-size image of a human skull; the skull itself is copied from the skull of a European man, about 35 years old, who died sometime between 1720 and 1910; real teeth are inserted into the skull. The creation is encrusted with 8,601 industrial diamonds weighing a total of 1,100 carats; they cover it completely, like pavement. In the center of the forehead of the skull is a large pale pink diamond of 52.4 carats of standard brilliant cut. The sculpture is called For the Love of God and is the most expensive sculpture by a living author - £50 million.

In 2011, Hirst designed the cover of the Red Hot Chili Peppers album “I’m with you.”

Works

Today in the section “Art in Five Minutes” we will talk about the most famous artist of our time - Damien Stephen Hirst. We will deal with a shark in formaldehyde using a Mobius strip, find out how medieval art resonates with a diamond skull, and embark on a transgression to find out whether there is life in death.

Reference: Damien Hirst is an English artist, entrepreneur, art collector, and the most celebrated figure of the Young British Artists group, dominating the art scene since the 1990s. Born June 7, 1965 in Bristol, UK.

What is the central theme of Hirst's works?

Short: Death.

More details: The fundamental confrontation between the denial of death and the awareness of its inevitability is the central theme of the artist. Hirst doesn't walk around, he goes inside death itself. To thoroughly explore the topic, in his youth the artist went to the anatomical theater to make sketches and worked part-time in the morgue.

Since Hirst has many works related to death, we will look at a specific installation “A Thousand Years” from 1990 - one of the author’s most significant works. It is a double combined box: in the first enclosure there is a cow's head and an electric fly swatter, in the second there are larvae and flies. There are 4 holes cut in the partition between these cubes. The flies, flying into the first cube, immediately divided into 2 different groups: the first flew straight to the lamps and, touching them, immediately died, and the second part of the flies tried to take place on the head of the dead cow.

The artist talks about it: “I remember sitting with Gary Hume once when I was working on this installation, he asked: "What are you working on now?" I replied, "Well, I have a glass box, a cow's head, worms and flies. All I have to do is find a fly swatter that will kill them all." He looked at me as if I were crazy. And I thought, "Great. This is a great way to explain it as something crazy - you just explain it to someone so that they already have an opinion. And this is despite the fact that they have no idea what it really is, so that they cannot be prepared for what they see."

This installation refers us to Donald Judd, the father of minimalism. The artist refuses traditional beauty, figurativeness, and any sentimental content.
In this one work, Hirst captured the life cycle, he showed how orderly the chaos of life and death is.

It must be said that sometimes Hirst gets carried away: the Briton once called the New York terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 a work of art, for which he subsequently had to apologize.

I will die - and I want to live forever. I cannot escape death, and I cannot escape the desire to live. I want to see at least a glimpse of what it is like to die.

Hirst the richest artist in the world?

Briefly: D A.

Read more: P at least that’s what all Western publications say. The artist's total fortune is estimated at one billion dollars. Hirst sold the complete "Beautiful Inside My Head Forever" collection at Sotheby's for £111 million ($198 million), breaking the record for a single-artist auction. Also on the list of the richest artists are Takashi Murakami, Jeff Koons, Jasper Johns. By the way, the approximate salary of Hirst's assistants is $32,000.

What is the name of the style in which the artist works?

Short: Neoconceptualism.

More details: Neoconceptualism or postconceptualism is a movement that represents the modern stage of development of conceptualism of the 60s and 70s. Neo-conceptualism emerged in the United States and Europe in the late 1970s. Neoconceptualism, like conceptual art, is first and foremost an art of questions. Conceptual art today continues to raise fundamental questions not only about the definition of art itself, but also about politics, media and society. Neoconceptualism is mainly associated with the activities of the Young British Artists, who loudly declared themselves in the 1990s.

Major Events

1991: Charles Saatchi finances Damien Hirst and the following year the Saatchi Gallery exhibits his work “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living” - a shark in formaldehyde.

1993: Vanessa Beecroft holds her first performance in Milan.

1999: Tracey Emin has been nominated for the Turner Prize. Part of her exhibition is the installation "My Bed".

2001: Martin Creed wins the Turner Prize for "The Lights Going On and Off", an empty room in which lights turn on and off.

2005: Simon Starling receives the Turner Prize for the Shedboatshed, a wooden structure he sailed on the Rhine.

Does Hirst have paintings?

Short: Yes.

More details: Hirst was never focused on painting, even in his early days attending the pioneering Goldsmiths College in the 1980s. Unlike other schools, which attracted students who could not get into a real college, Goldsmith School attracted many talented students and inventive teachers. Goldsmith introduced an innovative program that did not require students to draw or paint.
But Hirst still has three uses of paint.
First- these are spot paintings, colored circles that grow from Jeff Koons. This project is still ongoing. One day, an artist opened exactly the same exhibitions in several cities around the world, the entire space of which was hung with paintings with multi-colored circles.
Second- this is a spin painting, which involves a rotating circle on which paint is poured, so the paint itself paints a dynamic canvas. The most famous creation in this style was the entire Olympic Stadium. Hirst was commissioned to decorate the arena and poured paint in the shape of the British flag to celebrate the opening of the Olympics. But as we see, neither the first nor the second is painting, it is the use of paints without drawing.

People who criticize modern art forget that all art was once modern.

Third- these are works in the style of Francis Bacon. Starting out, Hirst himself said that he would not paint, because his paintings would be absolutely secondary; he was aware of his own epigonism. But, for some reason, he changed his mind and brought his painting to the personal exhibition “Requiem”, which was shown here at the Pinchuk Art Center in 2009. In addition to old works, the artist exhibited a new painting series called “Skull paintings”. They became the main target for sarcastic invective from critics. “It feels like what the viewer is seeing is a pastiche of Bacon, made by a student,”- one of them remarked. Many critics of contemporary art believe that once, in the early 90s, Hirst was the undisputed leader of New British Art and generally stood at the forefront of modern art, but those times are long gone, and now yesterday’s avant-garde artist has turned into a supplier of ultra-expensive kitsch - like just to the taste and mind of Eastern European and Asian oligarchs, but Hirst’s paintings are simply helpless.

Hirst also has a painting “For Mom”. It depicts fruits and flowers, without allusions, reminiscences or riddles. Just fruits and flowers. Because ever since he became an artist, his mother always reproached him that his son could not draw anything “normal.” So he wrote, really, what could be more normal than fruits and flowers?

It recently emerged that Hirst locks himself in his garden shed and secretly paints there. "Animals in formaldehyde no longer shock audiences; they are much more surprised when you pick up your brushes and canvas and go back to basics."- he commented on his activities, shameful for a modern artist.

Genius or fiction?

Briefly: K As it was said in holy scripture, “if he dies, we will find out.”

More details: Hirst is unimaginably rich and successful, and he is also a contemporary - this is an ideal formula that generates many discussions around the work of the Briton.

Some critics consider the artist an artificially created phenomenon with a bag of money instead of a head. Others, as we have already said, revile his painting, pointing to his imitation of Bacon. But Julian Spalding went the furthest, he considers Hirst a fiction and simply a non-artist, ironically calling him a con-artist, which on the one hand speaks of deceptiveness, since “con” in English means “to fool”, and on the other hand, is an abbreviation from the word "conceptualism", which is funny. By the way, “con” in English means another obscene meaning, something like “member”, that’s what Bill Gates was called at school, so if you try to create a folder on your desktop with that name, you won’t succeed. Try it now.
Critics from the shore where the grass is greener find Hirst a genius who distills the pure spirit of art from the mash of everyday life with the help of ingenuity and advanced technology. There are many arguments for this, the most significant of which (referring to historical discourse) is that he managed to create a completely new art from the most ancient theme of “death”. On the other hand, during Hirst's retrospective exhibition at MOMA, attendance increased by 20 percent, what other arguments are needed?

The Briton is so popular and controversial that other artists create art out of him. Spanish sculptor Eugenio Merino created an object depicting the suicide of Damien Hirst: a doll similar to the British artist kneels in a glass box with a pistol pressed to his bloody temple. The object, as The Daily Telegraph writes, is called "4 the Love of Go(l)d". Thus, it plays on the title of one of Hirst's most famous works - a diamond-encrusted skull ("For the Love of God"), and the word "gold" - "gold": the Briton is considered one of the most expensive artists in the world. Merino claims that he is a fan of Hirst’s work. He says this about his object: “Of course, this is a joke, but this is the paradox: if he [Hirst] commits suicide, then his works will become even more expensive.”

Whatever the critics of this world may say, The Guardian correspondent said it best: “In an age of creation, in a world ruled by eclecticism and money, Hirst is “the artist we deserve.”

Question from PR manager Anastasia Kosyreva

What is the difference between a shark in Hurst's formaldehyde and an animal in formaldehyde in biology lessons? Why is the first art and the second is not?

Short:“Because the first is in the gallery, and the second is not” (c) Hirst

More details: Hirst, of course, jokes, he is generally a very funny person, this can be seen in all his interviews. But we'll talk seriously.
The installation “Tiger Shark in Fomaldehyde” is called “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of the Living.” The shark was caught by an Australian fisherman and sold to the artist for $9,500. And the installation was sold in 2004 to collector Steve Cohen for $12 million. Being near this shark, I remember the title of Jonathan Foer’s novel “Extremely Close, Incredibly Loud.” The ugly mouth of the shark is wide open, this creates the effect of a growl, a scream, as a symbol of the pain of dying. The shark's gaping mouth refers to the paintings of Hirst's favorite artist, Francis Bacon. In general, Hirst could have taken any animal, but he chose a shark not to shock society; a shark is a source of danger and a symbol of death. The shark doubles death: it itself is dead and, at the same time, the bearer of death. The most unusual phenomenon among sharks is intrauterine cannibalism. About 70% of sharks die in brutal battles right in the womb.

But the most important thing in this work is not the shark or formaldehyde. What is important is that this installation is located in a sterile, minimalist space, again continuing the Judd tradition. A constructed scheme of contrast between the abstract and durable form of demonstration and its transitory objective content. Art, “on behalf of” which the form of the showcase acts, fulfills its traditional function here - stopping time.

There is also a conceptual play in this work, in which the object of the image is the same as the image itself. Simply put, death represents death. Such a semantic Mobius strip, when the meaning of a work closes on itself, when the work tells about itself.

Hirst says about his work: "I'm trying to unravel death. It's hard for people to understand their own mortality, and many of my works are about this. My shark is an attempt to describe this feeling, the feeling of irrational fear of death. That's why I used a real shark, so large that it could swallow a person entirely. And I placed it in a container with a liquid of such a size that it would give the viewer goosebumps. And this is not a gloomy look at the world. On the contrary, I hoped that death would serve as an inspiration and a source of energy for the audience.

Question from editor-in-chief Evgenia Lipskaya:

Why did he choose butterflies as his main material? Did he kill them or collect them dead?

Short: 1. In the short life of a butterfly it is easier to show the life cycle, also the death of a butterfly is a very clear demonstration of both the beautiful and the terrible.

2. He did not kill them with his own hands, but he did not collect them either. The butterflies were brought from “special nurseries” and then died their own death in the gallery.

More details: The artist’s most famous installation, where the main characters are butterflies, is called “Falling in and Falling Out of Love.” Butterflies flew freely in the gallery, which also contained dishes with flowers and fruits. Since butterflies are short-lived creatures, they dropped dead right in the middle of the exhibition. They hit the paintings and smeared, thus creating abstract works. The pictures turned out to be beautiful and ominous, since we are talking about dead creatures. Then he went so far as to use real wings of dead butterflies to make stained glass windows for Gothic cathedrals. Initially, visitors did not know that the butterflies were dying over the course of the exhibition; 400 new creatures were introduced every week. When the public learned that 9 thousand butterflies died during the exhibition, they began to attack Hirst. The artist’s opponents particularly emphasized the fact that in their natural habitat butterflies could live much longer, up to nine months. However, Tate representatives had one answer to all the reproaches: conditions were created for the butterflies as close as possible to their habitat. By the way, butterflies were brought in cocoons; they were born at the exhibition and died there.

Initially, these were pupae scattered throughout the room, but after the metamorphosis process was completed, the exotic butterflies that were born flew straight to the huge canvases with fresh flowers. Butterflies stuck to sticky canvases and after a while died, becoming part of the picture. Moreover, on the back of the giant canvases there were attached huge ashtrays filled to the brim with cigarette butts.

There are also the “Butterflies” and “Kaleidoscopes” series, where, in the first case, dead butterflies are glued onto a freshly painted canvas without using glue, and in the second, they are tightly stuck to each other, creating patterns reminiscent of a kaleidoscope.

It should be said that butterflies are not the only insect that Hirst turns into art. He has a job that is made entirely of flies. That is, the canvas is covered as densely as possible by flies, so the artist created his own “black square”.

Question from beauty editor Christina Kilinskaya:

Who bought this skull and for how much?

Short: A consortium that includes Hirst himself, his manager Frank Dunphy, the head of the White Cube gallery and the famous Ukrainian philanthropist Victor Pinchuk for $100 million.

More details: The installation is called “For the Love of God” and represents a human skull made of platinum and encrusted with diamonds. According to Hirst, the name was inspired by the words of his mother when she addressed him with the words: “For the love of God, what are you going to do next?” (“Tell me, what will you do next?” For the love of God - literally, a quote from the First Epistle of John: “For this is the love of God” (1 John 5:3)). The skull is made of platinum, like a slightly reduced version of the skull of a 35-year-old European who lived between 1720 and 1810. The entire area of ​​the skull, with the exception of the original teeth, is studded with 8,601 diamonds weighing a total of 1,106.18 carats. In the center of the forehead is the main element of the composition - a pink pear-shaped diamond. The work cost Hirst £14 million.

In 2007, for investment purposes, a group of investors, which included Hirst himself, his manager Frank Dunphy, the head of the White Cube gallery and the famous Ukrainian philanthropist Victor Pinchuk, bought the skull for 50 million pounds (100 million US dollars). This is a record price paid for a work by a living artist.

“For the Love of the Lord” is a synthesis of kitsch, pop art, classics and the eternal theme of death. The skull is an extremely visual implementation of the classic theme of Western art Vanitas vanitatum - the artist demonstrates that both money and luxury are decay and vanity.

In essence, this work is a rather witty rejoinder from Hirst about his own commercial success: instead of bashfully disguising it, the artist flaunts it - investing in the creation of an object at a cost of 15 million pounds. And the fact that this object is a skull only emphasizes the triumph of the religion of the golden calf in the modern world.

However, the artistic community did not appreciate the self-revealing aspect of the new works of the English artist. In an era of ethically and politically concerned art, Damien Hirst has become an odious figure, and the proper insider reaction to the mention of his name is a grimace of irony, irritation and boredom.

Hirst himself says that "this object symbolizes the wealth and value of life" and adds "By the way, diamond skulls are also about how decorating death is a great way to come to terms with this idea."

My faith in art is not much different from religious fanaticism. We all need something to navigate in the dark.