Eyeblog

"Banks fall over: Art triumphs" - Damien Hirst's Sotheby's Auction

In a week that saw apparently indestructible investment banks fall apart and stock markets tumble surely the only man in London who can be happy with his finances is the most infamous YBA, Damien Hirst. Despite the economic downturn his auction at Sotheby’s of 223 new works, Beautiful Inside My Head Forever, was a resounding success with sales totalling over £110 million, including the centrepiece of the 11 day exhibition and 2 day sale, ‘The Golden Calf’, which reached an auction price record for Hirst, selling at £10,345,250. The mood amongst the art world’s movers and shakers was jubilant post sale with news filtering in from the faltering city enterprises, Exhibitions Secretary for the Royal Academy, Sir Norman Rosenthal, proclaimed “Banks fall over: art triumphs”.

Lots included a menagerie of pickled animals and sharks, items from the continuing series of found pharmacy objects, various butterfly paintings, and (ones for Eyestorm Trade customers to keep an eye on) numerous ‘spot’ and ‘spin’ paintings, fetching up to £750,000 and almost £1,000,000 respectively. All were part of an historical auction, the first of an artist taking his work directly to auction, bypassing the usual dealers and galleries, and the largest sale of a single artist’s work.

Only five lots were left unsold at the end of the second day of auctioning and it has been reported that these items were sold shortly after the sale concluded, proving that regardless of what his critics may have said before the sale, Hirst is the most successful and profitable artist of his generation and in these financially uncertain times art is not suffering, in fact it is prospering.

The artist, who had suffered some anxiety over the auction, was quoted at the end of the sale as saying, “I think the market is bigger than anyone knows, I love art and this proves I’m not alone and the future looks great for everyone.”

See work by Damien Hirst.

By Hannah Shilland

In Association with the Institute of Contemporary Arts

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