Damien Hirst talks about "A Thousand Years"

It is a very provocative work that actually contains an entire lifecycle of several maggots. The maggots hatch out of a minimal white box and then feed on a cow's head conveniently placed in the larger glass case. Some of the flies then die in the "insect-o-cuter" while other survive to continue their rather revolting cycle.

• Category

  Film & Animation

[BeerGogglesReviews]

Why does art have to be Whistlers Mother? 'A Thousand Years' is a look at the circle of life in a microcosm. Birth, sex, and death. Even the question of whether 'acts of god' are random, chosen by those rolling the die of chance, or acts of a higher power. Art is anything that makes you think or moves you. It isn't always right or wrong, but it isn't just shortbread tins and 1000 piece puzzles. It's not there to match our drapes.

[productionrs]

FUCK DAMIEN HIRST

[Brady2k10]

and hes got over 200 million hahaha seriously... some people man... some people..

[Brady2k10]

what a fuckin fraud this man is seriously yet these dumb retard snobs buy his bullshit "works of art" that he copied from other people, guys a fucking fraud plain and simple.

[Dragonion2010]

Cheers, my friend :)

[BeerGogglesReviews]

Well I like it, and as much as I can be ignorant along with the worst of them, I ain't a jetsetter. It's a matter of personal taste. Not really anything wrong with anyone's taste. It's their personal thing. In the same way you are not wrong for not understanding the piece at all. I think we'll just agree to disagree. Nice the share opinions though my friend. If we were all the same the world would be in camouflage like grey moths on grey trees. Cheers dude!

[Dragonion2010]

I see what saying although I would argue that if an artist does in fact posses a true talent then his work will (eventually) promote itself. I myself, for example, would never buy anything from an artist just because all my friends thought he was awesome. Likewise I would have no problem buying a piece from some completely unknown artist if I felt his art appealed to me somehow. It's a question of integrity, and imo targeting ignorant jetsetters doesn't earn you a lot of points on that account.

[BeerGogglesReviews]

The same can be said about any artist. If you are painting bowls of flowers in your front room you are an unknown painter. Somebody needs to see a value in your work as a commodity. Unfortunately as with anything new, it's not always a commodity in the artists lifetime. New art needs acceptance to be bought and paid for and that takes time. Closed minds will open their wallets when it matches their friends art. Unfortunately 'dogs playing poker' or 'love is' pictures are more acceptable to many.

[Dragonion2010]

The main reason I don't acknowledging Hirst as an artist is that if people like him are never discovered (that is, some rich and eccentric art collector randomly determines that this guy is a genius and announces it to the world) nobody will ever hear of them. The same people who are willing to pay $8000 for a broken jar of mustard with his signature on it today (justified by assigning some artistic value/interpretation to it) would laugh at him if it hadn't been determined how brilliant he is.

[BeerGogglesReviews]

As you say the artistic skill is in the creation. If it was purely in brush work application skills, Groundforce's Tommy Walsh would be in the National Gallery and Van Gogh would be painting sheds. Yes Bieber can hold a note better than most karaoke singers, but he will NEVER be an artist. Also Cohen will never have 20 million Twitter followers hanging on his every word of Bieberean wisdom. It doesn't matter that you don't get Hirst's work, but rather than chastise, try opening your mind to it.

[Dragonion2010]

I didn't call him a retard; I just stated that any person in the world (including mentally retarded people) is automatically born with the artistic "skills" required to make his creations.

Comparing the voices of Cohen and Bieber in an analogy to visual art is more like comparing the brushes two different artists use; some like Cohen's stroke, others like Bieber's, but as much as I share your view on the latter his music does require a certain degree of skills, which qualifies him as a musician.

[BeerGogglesReviews]

Its a bit harsh to say an artist is a retard because YOU don't get anything from it. Also skill in a medium doesn't necessarily make art. To use your music analogy Lou Reed, Leonard Cohen and Tom Waits could be described as not having as pure a voice as say Justin Bieber, but I know which I'd rather hear. I know which of those is teenage musical masturbation with absolutely no artistic value, and which is art.

Like music, art doesn't have to be pretty.

Cow or Bieber 'singing'? Hand me the hammer