Saturday 7 April 2012

Damien Hirst exhibition, Tate Modern.



Hirst’s exhibition was full of his life’s work, showing a variety of art works from animals preserved in formaldehyde to glass cabinets full of crystal’s. The majority of his exhibition focuses on death and life cycles.

Although quite disgusting I found Hirst’s piece  ‘A Thousand Years’ very interesting, consisting of a glass cabinet containing a rotting cow’s head, a box of flies and a fly killer. Showing a whole life cycle within one piece. 

Throughout his exhibition there are lots of ‘spot paintings’, which consist of a variety of sized canvases with multi coloured spots painted accurately across the canvas. Seeing these spot paintings, and his cabinets full of perfectly placed drug boxes you get a real sense of his attention to detail and accuracy.

He seems to obsess over certain objects, one being butterflies. He exhibited the butterflies in an interesting way, relating back to life and death. One room was full of bright canvases with dead butterflies placed on looking peaceful. In the next room he had stuck cocoons to canvases, the room was full of beautiful butterflies that had emerged from these cocoons. Another object he seemed to focus on was cigarettes, through having various cabinets full of cigarette butts, placed a centimetre apart and a huge ash tray full of butts leaving a rather horrible smell. He described a cigarette as a 'mini life cycle'.

I don’t feel Hirst’s work represents artistic skill, considering he has a large team of technicians who work for him, but what I found interesting was his vast interest in death and his confidence to explore it. 


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