[lbo-talk] Damien Hirst? Anthony Earnshaw!

[James Heartfield]

‘In the early 90s, Hirst seemed like a breath of fresh air, a rave-era  blast against the terrible, starchy politeness that characterised the  British art scene. In a world of high theory and rigorously monochrome  wardrobes, it was funny to say that you paid assistants to make your art  "because I couldn't be fucking arsed doing it". Then, when stories of  your millions were all over the press, and it came out that those  assistants were extremely poorly paid, it seemed less funny.’

Are the pyramids less impressive because they were built by slaves? Hirst’s work is poor – and was poor – not because of the social relationships within which it was created, but because there is not enough of a transformation taking place, or, put another way, there is not enough work in it. Like a lot of the so called ‘young British artists’ (yuk) the pay-off is too immediate, the impact to quick and cheap, and easily exhausted, all sensation, no wit. Thinned out motifs of surrealism, and dada. The best thing you could say in Hirst’s favour, is that (I understand) he owns some work by the late, and great, Tony Earnshaw.

See him in Bradford ‘till July http://www.bradfordmuseums.org/venues/cartwrighthall/detail.php?ID=348

Or buy the book http://www.amazon.com/Anthony-Earnshaw-Michel-Rumy/dp/0955827388/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1332278740&sr=1-1 (I have a chapter in there)