Damien Hirst-For the Love of God

Damien Hirst
For the Love of God

The Sculpture for the Love of God by Damien Hirst went of display June 1, 2007 in the White Cube gallery at St. James in London. This sculpture is a platinum cast of a human face and skull encrusted with as many as 8,601 diamonds, with the keystone located in the middle of the forehead being a pear shaped pink diamond. It is estimated to have cost $14 million dollars to complete and was going for an asking price of $50 million when it was on display.

Hirst seemed to have been influenced by the previous works of Spiritus Callidus by John Lekay which was a sculpture of a skull but much more primitive than the likes of Hirst's sculpture but still very much similar, Lekay was quoted saying When I heard he was doing it, I felt like I was being punched in the gut. When I saw the image online, I felt that a part of me was in the piece. I was a bit shocked." , Hirst though said his work was influenced by the Aztec Turqouise Skull which was on display at the British Museum.

Hirsts work came with some criticism, many people seen the work as costing way too much, and the works was in a way mocked when Peter Fuss made a similar skull work out of plastic and glass and using fake diamonds instead of real diamonds, costing only $1000 instead of Hirst's $14 million. Criticism also came from art critic Richard Dorment, saying it questioned something about the morality of art and money, he was quoted saying "If anyone but Hirst had made this curious object, we would be struck by its vulgarity. It looks like the kind of thing Asprey or Harrods might sell to credulous visitors from the oil states with unlimited amounts of money to spend, little taste, and no knowledge of art. I can imagine it gracing the drawing room of some African dictator or Colombian drug baron. But not just anyone made it - Hirst did. Knowing this, we look at it in a different way and realise that in the most brutal, direct way possible, For the Love of God questions something about the morality of art and money."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_Love_of_God
http://www.flickr.com/photos/11892575@N04/1397590991/
http://www.geekologie.com/2007/06/damien_hirsts_for_the_love_of.php