Damien Hirst
Damien Hirst
Damien Steven Hirstis an English artist, entrepreneur, and art collector. He is the most prominent member of the group known as the Young British Artists, who dominated the art scene in the UK during the 1990s. He is internationally renowned, and is reportedly the United Kingdom's richest living artist, with his wealth valued at £215m in the 2010 Sunday Times Rich List. During the 1990s his career was closely linked with the collector Charles Saatchi, but increasing frictions came to...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPainter
Date of Birth7 June 1965
I think if you've made it, why not name it?
I quite like it to be risky. I'm not ready to sit down in a chair with my name on it yet. I've arrived at that point in the art world where there really is a chair that you sit in.
Buy art, build a museum, put your name on it, let people in for free. That's as close as you can get to immortality...
I'm 43. I'm not ready to sit down in a chair with my name on it yet.
I thought it might be nice to have a little line on the side going, just in case, of doing famous people's pets for them, in formaldehyde.
I think it's just, I really enjoy art, and I just hope that when people come and see the exhibition, I want them to be just grabbed and thrown around a bit by visual things.
The difference between art about death and actual death is that one's a celebration and the other's a dull fact.
People don't like contemporary art, but all art starts life as contemporary - I can't really see a difference.
It's good to have a title that's not just one word. If you're gonna title it, you might as well try and say something.
Kids are naturally gifted at art from a very young age. The problem is when they get older and become self-conscious. The process should always be fun, though.
'Painting like a child' isn't a negative for me... it's something only great artists can really achieve. The childlike quality of some of Picasso's drawings is precisely what makes them so masterful and extraordinary; the ability to express complete visions, feelings and portraits through a continuous line.
I had a passport where I wrote 'artist' under 'occupation' and I remember thinking, 'That's it, it's proved!'
I've had laser eye surgery and I don't wear glasses any more, so people just go, 'You're not Damien Hirst.' I don't get recognized on the street.
People always say that my work is sensational or shocking but there are truly shocking things you could do, and my sculptures don't go anywhere near that.