TRACES: Damien Hirst

Today is the occasion to bear in mind Damien Hirst (7/6/1965- ), since emerging onto the international art scene in the late 1980s, he has created installations, sculptures, paintings, and drawings that examine the complex relationships between art and beauty, religion and science, and life and death. Through documents or interviews, starting with: moments and memories, we reveal out from the past-unknown sides of big personalities, who left their indelible traces in time and history…

By Dimitris Lempesis

Damien Hirst was born in Bristol, England in 1965. His family moved to Leeds shortly after he was born, where he spent much of his childhood. After his parents separated when he was 12, he was raised exclusively by his mother. Coming of age in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Hirst took a keen interest in the punk music and social scene that was taking hold within British culture, gravitating toward its rejection of tradition and confrontational, gritty subject matter. He was a particular fan of the Sex Pistols – even though his mother once melted one of their LP’s into a fruit bowl – and would reference them numerous times in his later work. Hirst pursued a B.A. in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, University of London from 1986 to 1989, though his application was rejected the first time he applied. He became intensely absorbed in his studies, and quickly became a prominent member of the student community at Goldsmiths, participating in numerous clubs and organizing student-run events. During his summer breaks, he worked part-time at a mortuary back home in Leeds, an experience that would strongly influence the themes and materials he later utilized as an artist. He occasionally drew specimens and cadavers (a traditional practice among artists in the west) and the job also provided him with the technical knowledge he would later use to transform biological specimens into sculptures. During his second year at Goldsmiths, he was the lead organizer of a group exhibition called “Freeze”. The show would mark a turning point in his career. In addition to his own work, the show featured pieces by sixteen students, including Fiona Rae, Sarah Lucas, and other emerging talents in postmodernist art. As a group, they would become known for their take-no-prisoners approach to art, employing shockingly unconventional materials and introducing concepts that challenged the definition of art. The exhibition unfashionable and far-flung neighborhood. Hirst had initially approached a number of commercial galleries, but found little interest in the project. Michael Craig-Martin, one of Hirst’s professors, persuaded a number of influential people in the British art scene to attend the show. These included Norman Rosenthal, Nicholas Serota and Charles Saatchi, then-owner of the world’s largest advertising firm who ran his own London gallery. “Freeze” and Hirst’s subsequent warehouse shows helped to inspire Saatchi to sell off much of his significant collection of contemporary American art and invest in the new generation of British artists. He hunted down pieces from student shows and alternative gallery spaces, culminating in a series of exhibitions throughout the 1990s with the title “Young British Artists”. Saatchi’s nomenclature would stick to Hirst and his peers, who are often still referred to as “the Young British Artists,” or YBAs, despite many now being in their 40s and 50s. In 1991, Saatchi became Hirst’s patron, offering to fund whatever the artist chose to produce. The arrangement between the two men was quick to bear fruit. Saatchi’s first “Young British Artists” show in 1992 brought Hirst international attention and acclaim. His first Saatchi-funded work was titled “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living”, a large installation piece featuring a preserved tiger shark in a large glass case. The piece earned Hirst a nomination for the Turner Prize, given to contemporary British artists under 50. Although he did not win, he would eventually claim the award in 1995. Almost immediately, he established himself as a divisive and controversial figure in the contemporary art world. His sculptures of preserved, dead animals have been his most famous and hotly debated pieces.

For instance, in 1995, “Two Fucking and Two Watching”, a piece featuring a rotting cow and bull, was banned by New York public health officials, who feared “vomiting among the visitors.” He continued to pursue shocking and challenging projects that provoked passionate, love-hate reactions from the art world. He took inspiration from his stint at the morgue, and also cited Francis Bacon  as a major influence. Bacon, in turn, viewed the installation and rhapsodized about it in a letter to his friend. He would become one of Hirst’s major supporters. By the late 1990s, Hirst had become a key figure in British art and culture. He directed the music video for “Country House” by the hugely popular band Blur, and wrote and directed a short film starring comedian Eddie Izzard. His lofty status within contemporary British art was cemented by 1997’s “Sensation” show at London’s Royal Academy, an event which critics have since regarded as the formal acceptance of the YBAs into the mainstream. From the late 1990s onward, several of the YBAs became mainstream celebrities in their own right, known for their swagger, swearing, and rock n’ roll attitude. Hirst was known for his drunken cocaine binges and outrageous behavior, among them meeting a curator naked, and allegedly removing his pants to insert a chicken bone into his foreskin at a bar in Dublin. Hirst attracted further controversy when his business relationship with Saatchi ended in 2003. Hirst disapproved of the way Saatchi had exhibited his work at his new gallery space, and was particularly upset that a Mini Cooper decorated in the style of one of his spot paintings was being exhibited as a serious artwork. He pulled all his works from the show, which in turn led Saatchi to call off a major Hirst retrospective at the Tate Modern. The artist decided to end his relationship with his long-time patron, buying back a number of early works. Hirst has had little difficulty finding buyers and audiences for his work since ending his relationship with Saatchi. While recognizing the inherent value of public spectacle, he was savvy enough to know that shock was not sustainable as a style, and though his work continues to be highly polarizing, he adapts and innovates to suit the demands of an audience that expects him to take risks. In September 2008, he took an unprecedented step for a living artist by selling a complete show/ “Beautiful Inside My Head Forever”, exclusively by auction at Sotheby’s. It set a world record for the highest proceeds at auction by a living artist, 70.5 million pounds. Even as the global financial markets were crumbling, the auction helped make Hirst one of the richest artists in the world. Still, his work received mixed reviews. In 2009, he exhibited a group of paintings, “No Love Lost, Blue Paintings”, which provoked the ire of many critics, who labeled the pieces “dull” and “amateurish”. He has become an active member of Britain’s culinary scene, funding and designing a number of restaurants, some of which have been more successful than others. He also opened a store called Other Criteria, which produces affordable, limited-edition collector’s pieces. In October 2015, he opened the Newport Street Gallery in south London, showcasing his personal collection of over 3,000 works of art. During the 2017 Venice Biennale, he concurrently held his own solo exhibition, “Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable” in two venues. The monumental installation featured sculptures and other objects presented as the remains from a fictional 2,000-year-old shipwreck off the coast of Africa.