Hirst at Tate

I really do need to focus more of my blog on art --of all kinds. There may be about one billion different forms of art, and every one's tastes are subjective. You'll see people at gallery openings saying, "WTF?" when the next person strolling by says, "Wow, that's amazing!"

While in the UK, I got my fill in Edinburgh of the masters...Italian Renaissance, Impressionists, etc. Some of these masterpieces took painstaking years to complete. While in London, I wanted to see the Tate Modern. It's an iconic art museum that had several headliner showings. We decided on Damien Hirst. Why? Well, it was a complete departure from what I'd normally view, and challenges you to think and see things differently.

First, I will say that I was disturbed by pretty much 99% of his exhibit. I do believe he is more of an exhibitionist than anything. I'll leave out the flies, rotting meat, severed animals suspended in liquid and cigarette butts. I couldn't look at half of those exhibits. His butterflies were another story...it truly blurs the lines of beauty and death. Hirst likes to draw out the fact that even under the most beautiful circumstances, death is inevitable. Morbid, yes. Challenging, yes.

Now, even though we weren't allowed to take photos, we snuck a few in. This is a mosaic piece made of all butterfly wings. It was mesmerizing. He even has wallpaper now in this print. The colors are soft, and what could be more beautiful than butterfly wings? Well, then you think that every wing came from what is now a dead butterfly. Hmm, maybe sad after all.

These poor people had no idea they were in the way:-)

Close up.

Looks exactly like stained glass, right? Nope, more butterfly wings. I was a little concerned about exactly where Mr. Hirst got all these precious wings. I did a little research and turns out PETA hasn't been thrilled with his work and is outraged. From what I know, Hirst hasn't provided any answer about how he obtains the butterfly wings (and I don't want to know about the other animals) -- specifically, whether they were killed for the sake of art or collected after they were already dead.

On a prettier note, here are two of his pieces at the Byblos Art Hotel. Amazingly, his wheel art on the right has no death or ugliness about it...it's just paint!!