Sunday, June 03, 2007
Friday's news was full
of stuff about the artist Damien Hirst's latest work, a £50 million diamond encrusted skull. Not so much art as an another example of how obscene wealth can sometimes be. Mind you I think the work reflects very well the political and economic moment of its creation and provides yet another example of art gone to waste. Grrrr.
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7 comments:
odd. interesting contrast between the lasting (diamonds) and the ephemeral(life), particularly (as you said) given the obscenity of the gesture. Does seem to graphically elevate wealth over life.
Interesting that he'd like it done to his own skull. Lots of strange psychology could be ferreted out of that comment, I'll bet.
Reminds me of the desire for immortality that generated the pyramids.
H,
Think I prefer the pyramids, they've got more substance. Looking at the skull, there's no depth to it, no interest, no sophistication. What Hirst has done is present enormous wealth as if it is an important aesthetic, as if is it important art, as if it is art. When in fact the skull is just wealth, and wealth on it's own has no soul, has no heart either. Hirst has produced, for all it's cost, a hollow item, an item that is worth a lot but has no value. Hmmm, trust capitalism to create something that's worth a lot but has no value.
What an arse.
Are they real diamonds?
Maybe it's the juxtapposition he's trying to show...wealth and death. So much wealth in the world while others are dying.
I read both the 'for and against' his work and I can't decide who's right or wrong...both make good points.
His style doesn't appeal to me though. I don't need that sort of work to remind me of what I see here.
oh silly me, of course it's real diamonds.
he could've made his point visially without the real diamonds. such waste.
have you seen the movie, 'blood diamonds'? i haven't.
G,
I haven't seen the film Blood Diamonds but I do know what they are. I'm not sure what point he is making except that wealth is everything. I think the skull is a crude item and because of diamonds a brutal item as well. However I don't think he is making a radical point about death and life, I think he's making an obscene point about wealth and power. Nothing sophisticated about it at all which is why I think the skull is art only in the loosest sense of the phrase.
I've got no issues with someone using a skull for art or as a building brick for that matter. And soon you'll probably see a post of a place where skulls were used as bricks... but covering a skull with diamonds is not exactly what I would call art, to me it seems just a show of opulence.
I agree D, though the British press seems to like the object. For me I think it's ugly.
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