Name: Damien Hirst.
Age: 54.
Appearance: Taxi driver from Romford.
Occupation: Artist. Enfant terrible (retired).
Net worth: More than £200m, apparently. Often said to be the richest artist in the UK, the world, the universe.
Sharks pickled in formaldehyde, that’s the bloke, isn’t it? I can see you know your contemporary art, although he has turned his back on conceptualism and is concentrating on life-affirming paintings of cherry blossom these days.
How lovely. What else is he up to? Hirst has been doing a series of fascinating self-interviews on Instagram, answering questions sent in by people who follow him on social media. “What is art?” “How do you define a ‘great’ artist?” “What will your legacy be?” “What’s your favourite variety of crisps?” All the big issues.
And the answer? Cheese and onion, of course.
No, the answer to the question: “What is art?” Oh, who cares about that? The truly revelatory moment comes when someone asks him whether he has ever done a painting with his, er, nether regions.
Nether regions? Use your imagination.
OK, well, has he? Apparently not, although it is suggested that in his hell-raising, drink- and drug-fuelled youth he was not averse to putting a lit cigarette in his penis and pretending it was smoking.
Didn’t Titian do the same thing? Try to take this seriously.
OK, back to his Instagram revelation. Ah yes. So he has never painted with it, but he does say that he and his fellow YBA –
Young British Artist. Thank you – that he and his fellow YBA Angus Fairhurst once dressed as clowns, while the performance artist Leigh Bowery painted their genitalia in fluorescent colours.
Those crazy YBAs. Indeed. Hirst says his was painted yellow with blue spots and that he would show it to people for a pound. It was either that or “you could have a spin painting”, he recalls of those halcyon days in the early 90s when he was just setting out in his haphazard pursuit of art-world domination.
And which did people choose for their pound? He answers 98 questions in his Instagram interviews, but that, sadly, is not one of them.
What else do we learn from the posts? He prefers Rembrandt to Dalí. He hasn’t had a drink for 13 years and his favourite tipple these days is rooibos tea. The best moment of his career was selling a piece of art for £10,000 – after that the money became meaningless. And the secret of art is self-belief and a willingness to make your paintings bigger.
Size is everything. You said it.
Do say: “The Instagram interviews are great. Hirst comes across as a real human being.”
Don’t say: “BUT IS IT ART?”
