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Hirst's life •
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Damien Hirst: a
life in brief
| 1965 |
Born
in Bristol, the son of a car salesman. |
| 1970s |
Brought
up and schooled in Leeds. |
| 1984 |
Gets
an E Grade in his Art A-level exam. |
| 1985 |
Takes
a foundation course at Leeds School of Art. |
| 1986-89 |
Completes
a degree in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, London. |
| 1988 |
Curates
the student exhibition, Freeze, in a warehouse at Surrey
Docks in East London. The exhibition, which brought together many
of the names which were to define British art in the 1990s, was
attended by Charles Saatchi. |
| 1990 |
Charles
Saatchi buys a Hirst medicine cabinet for £1,000. |
| 1991 |
Hirst
holds his first solo exhibition, entitled In and Out of Love,
at the Woodstock Street Gallery in London. Solo exhibitions also
take place at the Institute of Contemporary Art in London and
the Emmanuel Perrotin Gallery in Paris. |
| 1992 |
Hirst's
work is included in the Young British Artists exhibition
at the Saatchi Gallery in London. He displays The Physical
Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, a tiger
shark in a glass tank of formaldehyde. The piece, commissioned
by Saatchi for £45,000, earns Hirst a Turner Prize nomination.
|
| 1993 |
Holds
solo exhibitions in Los Angeles and Cologne. |
| 1994 |
Another
of Hirst's formaldehyde installations, a sheep in a tank entitled
Away from the Flock, is bought for £250,000. 'Baa-rmy,'
comments the Sun newspaper. Vegetarians protest about it,
and it is vandalised with black ink while on show at the Some
Went Mad, Some Ran Away exhibition, curated by Hirst,
at London's Serpentine Gallery. |
| 1995 |
There
is more controversy and publicity surrounding Hirst's animal sculptures
as he wins the Turner Prize for Some
Went Mad, Some Ran Away, an exhibition which Hirst curated
the previous year. Mother and Child Divided, a cow and
a calf sliced in half, is priced at £140,000.
Two Fucking and Two Watching,
which features a rotting cow and bull, is banned from exhibition
in New York by public health officials because of fears that the
smell of the carcasses 'might prompt vomiting among the visitors'.
Three solo exhibitions are
held, in Seoul, London and Salzburg. |
| 1996 |
Hirst
holds his first solo exhibition at the Gagosian gallery in New
York, entitled No Sense of Absolute
Corruption. Hirst's first short film, Hanging Around,
is shown in London. |
| 1998 |
Hirst branches
out, opening a restaurant, Pharmacy, in Notting Hill. He
records a pop music single with Fat Les, made up of actor Keith
Allen and Blur bassist Alex James. Vindaloo, a World
Cup tribute record, goes to number two in the charts. Hirst
sells God, a cabinet containing pharmaceutical products,
for £185,000 at Christies.
At the age of 33, Hirst
publishes his autobiography, I Want To Spend the Rest of
My Life Everywhere, with Everyone, One to One, Always, Forever,
Now.
|
| 1999 |
Hirst
sues British Airways over a billboard advert for its low-cost
airline, Go, which Hirst claims is based on one of his trademark
spot-paintings. |
| 2000 |
Hirst's
New York show is a spectacular success.
Hymn, one of the pieces in the show, is bought by Charles
Saatchi for £1 million. But Humbrol, a toy firm based in Hull,
considers legal action over the piece, which it claims is a replica
on a larger scale of its Young Scientist Anatomy Set, which sells
for £14.99. To fend off legal action, Hirst makes a 'goodwill'
payment to the commercial sculptor who designed the set. |
Home
Programme summary
Taking New York
Damien Hirst superstar
Hirst's art: for
Hirst's art: against
Hirst's life
Art attack
Find out more
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