Hated and loved, elusive yet an exhibitionist, accused of plagiarism but likened to Warhol (by Tracey Emin, in this case), British artist Damien Hirst has the power to spark global attention like no other artist of his generation. Thirty years since The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living – the tiger shark immersed in a tank of formaldehyde that marked a breakthrough in contemporary art – the man of records (in 2008 he sold a collection of new works at Sotheby’s for 198 million dollars, a sum never reached before) is now stirring interest not with one, but four projects. Throughout 2021 he will be the exhibition curator at London’s Gagosian Gallery in Britannia Street, where his retrospective Fact Paintings and Fact Sculptures has been showing this year. On 6 July, the exhibition Cherry Blossoms is due to open at the Fondation Cartier in Paris (pandemic permitting). For the last five years he has also been working on the digital art project The Currency: 10,000 drawings both on paper and in the form of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) that will soon be purchasable at popular prices and without the mediation of a gallery. But it is in Rome, at the Galleria Borghese, that the British artist seems to be aiming at a new level of excellence by pitting himself against Bernini, Canova, Caravaggio, Titian and Raphael, in the Archaeology Now exhibition (curated by Anna Coliva and Mario Codognato, and sponsored by Prada). Until 7 November, over 80 works from his Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable series (first shown in Venice in 2017) will be on view in all the rooms of the museum. It will present sculptures made from materials such as bronze, Carrara marble and malachite, but also paintings from his Colour Space series, in Italy for the first time. Just what it means to relate to famous works of Roman antiquity, the Renaissance, the Baroque and Neoclassicism, he explained from his studio in Soho, London, where he is completing the large and joyful paintings that will be the focus of the Parisian exhibition.
This year we’ll be seeing a lot of you all around the globe. I guess you’ve been quite busy in recent months?
During the lockdown I just started painting. I’ve got no assistants. I’ve been on my own. Also, I’ve been trying to think about how to do shows remotely. I just did a show in St. Moritz, which was quite a big show inside and outside. It was called Mental Escapology. I never visited. Because of the lockdown, nobody could travel. I ended up working on FaceTime and Zoom with installers, moving paintings by one inch. I was really surprised it worked well. I really would have never thought it was possible before.
This issue of L’Uomo Vogue is exploring aspects of “excellence”. Since it’s an extremely subjective matter, I’d like to understand what it means for you.
You can measure it in other people’s terms or your own. It’s a bit like if you want to be the best, but the best of what? The best in the class? But then the class gets bigger... If you look at a painting and try to decide if it’s excellent in its own terms and not in the history of art, you are on safer ground. I think you have to say it’s obvious what I was trying to do, and it was successful on its own terms. But you have to be careful because goals are complicated. I do yoga, and I had a yoga instructor who said to me, “Exhale,” and for a second I thought she said, “Excellent.” I’m too old to be excellent at yoga.
The upcoming exhibit at the Galleria Borghese in Rome will mix, juxtapose and maybe confuse past and present – the historical art and your works – in a sort of dialogue, but maybe it’s something more... Is it perhaps the will to confront the most famous masters of the past, in the middle of your artistic life? Striving for greatness, searching for immortality?
I think you have to look at it... Some things are very different. It was a long time ago, the masters, the greats, unbelievable sculptures. I would say that I don’t believe in genius. I believe in freedom. But when you look at Bernini you have to admit he was a genius. He just has some special talent that is unexplainable. Apart from that, all art begins its life as contemporary. Even Bernini. Everything begins as contemporary art, but there’s a feeling that people don’t like contemporary art. They like old-fashioned art, master art. Many people are suspicious of contemporary art. Contemporary art looks very different if you put it in the context with old art. There’s a huge time difference. But the thing that’s the same, which I think is really important, is that art has the same function, and that is to give people hope or to inspire people. To give people a distraction. To reveal something inside viewers that maybe they didn’t know they had. Hope is a huge thing. All of the art in the Borghese fills me with hope. I don’t feel competitive. When art is amazing, it’s an adventure, it takes you away from yourself. I think contemporary artists and old masters are doing the same thing. I don’t think there’s a lot of benefit if you compare my work to the old masters. It’s the same as comparing the world they were living in to the world of now, and it’s just so, so different. It’s difficult to make judgement calls. That said, I feel comfortable to be showing in this context. The Borghese is one of the most amazing museums in the world. It’s not just Bernini and all of these artists. It’s the whole context of the whole collection. That’s another artistic endeavour too. I feel daunted but at home.
(Continues)
All works by Damien Hirst.
Opening image: Damien Hirst photographed by Joe Hage, 2017.
Read the full interview by Federico Chiara in the July issue of L'Uomo, on newsstands from June 29th
