Auction
In July 2008, Hirst announced the unusual move of by-passing his established galleries for his next show Beautiful Inside My Head Forever and instead selling the work directly to the public by auction at Sotheby's. This was the first time that an artist of his standing had put work directly into the public market rather than operating through a dealer and gallery, who charge larger commissions than auction houses—and in this sale Sotheby's waived seller's fees for Hirst.
Hirst said, "It's a very democratic way to sell art and it feels like a natural evolution for contemporary art. Although there is risk involved, I embrace the challenge of selling my work in this way." The star items were The Golden Calf, an animal with 18-carat gold horns and hooves, preserved in formaldehyde, and The Kingdom, a preserved tiger shark; other preserved animals included a zebra and a "unicorn". The sale included spot and butterfly paintings, many incorporating gold and diamonds. The Gagosian Gallery, who have sold Hirst's work for 12 years, said they would attend to make bids to buy it, and said, "As Damien's long-term gallery, we've come to expect the unexpected."
21,000 visitors viewed the show, which was restricted to 656 ticketed clients on 15 September 2008, the first night (of the two-day sale), when all 56 lots were sold for £70.5 million, exceeding the estimate of £65 million. The £10.3 million sale of The Golden Calf beat Hirst's previous auction record. The Kingdom sold for £9.6 million, more than £3 million above its estimate. The second day of the sale, taking place in the morning and afternoon, raised £41 million, making a sale total of £111 million ($198 million) for 218 items with three remaining unsold (two others were sold privately after the evening auction).
The auction was successful beyond any expectations, setting a record for a single-artist auction, and exceeding by ten times higher the existing record for the sale of a single artist's work at Sotheby's. It occurred as the financial markets plunged and on the day when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt.
Read more about this topic: Beautiful Inside My Head Forever
Famous quotes containing the word auction:
“The white American man makes the white American woman maybe not superfluous but just a little kind of decoration. Not really important to turning around the wheels of the state. Well the black American woman has never been able to feel that way. No black American man at any time in our history in the United States has been able to feel that he didn’t need that black woman right against him, shoulder to shoulder—in that cotton field, on the auction block, in the ghetto, wherever.”
—Maya Angelou (b. 1928)