Damien Hirst

There are a lot of people who hate Damien Hirst, and let's be honest there is a lot to hate.  1. He has got to be the wealthiest artist in the world.   2.He has a posse of assistants who do the work for him.  Most notably the infamous dots of Chloroperoxidase, none of which he colored.  Hirst's recommendation is to buy the ones Rachel did.  3.  He does steal ideas from other artists, which unfortunately is something artists do.  4.He has a drug problem and one of the things he is known for is sticking a burning cigarette in the end of his penis (not a predesigned art thing, as far as we know)  5.  His website sucks.

That being said I find the work being produced in his name interesting, and the reactions he gets are also interesting.  His attitude is also appealing.  He is honest about Rachel, whereas Kinkade would have never admitted to her.  Part of why I like his work is because it has a point.  One of my favorite pieces is For the Love of God.  It is an 18th century skull that his assistants recast in platinum and set with diamonds.  There is a ton of content with this piece.  In my mind it speaks to the pointlessness of the diamonds, as the owner is clearly dead, perhaps with the inclusion of the title it points to an atheist streak within Hirst.


Besides who else can say that they have killed 9,000 butterflies in the name of art, ooops Lori Precious did in 1994.