Sale
Hirst said that the work was sold on 30 August 2007, for £50 million, to an anonymous consortium. Christina Ruiz, editor of The Art Newspaper, claims that Hirst had failed to find a buyer and had been trying to offload the skull for £38 million. Immediately after these allegations were made, Hirst claimed he had sold it for the full asking price, in cash, leaving no paper trail. The consortium that bought the piece included Hirst himself.
In the February 6, 2012 issue of Time Magazine, Hirst elaborated, in his "10 Questions" interview: "In the end I covered my fabrication and a few other costs by selling a third of it to an investment group, who are anonymous." The skull cost around £14 million to fabricate. Hirst did not specify the "other" costs, but it seems reasonable to assume they could be around £2 or £3 million. If one third of the skull was sold for £16 - £17 million, then the total value of the piece would be £48 - £51 million. This, presumably, is where the 2007 claim of a £50 million sale price came from.
Harry Levy, vice chairman of the London Diamond Bourse and Club, said "I would estimate the true worth of the skull as somewhere between £7 million and £10 million." Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs would expect £8.5 million in VAT payments, if Hirst really did receive £50 million. David Lee, editor of The Jackdaw, commented "Everyone in the art world knows Hirst hasn't sold the skull. It's clearly just an elaborate ruse to drum up publicity and rewrite the book value of all his other work."
Read more about this topic: For The Love Of God (artwork)
Famous quotes containing the word sale:
“I keep thinking that what I need
to do is buy my leg back.
Surely it is for sale somewhere,
poor broken tool, poor ornament.
It might be in a store somewhere beside a lady’s scarf.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“[T]he dignity of parliament it seems can brook no opposition to it’s power. Strange that a set of men who have made sale of their virtue to the minister should yet talk of retaining dignity!”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“I hate this shallow Americanism which hopes to get rich by credit, to get knowledge by raps on midnight tables, to learn the economy of the mind by phrenology, or skill without study, or mastery without apprenticeship, or the sale of goods through pretending that they sell, or power through making believe you are powerful, or through a packed jury or caucus, bribery and “repeating” votes, or wealth by fraud.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)