Expensive Art

Whoa!

For the Love of God is a sculpture by artist Damien Hurst produced in 2007. And yes that is a real human skull. Well the cast of one. The original was the skull of an 18th century, mid-30-year-old man. The once living human skull was used only to create a platinum cast model of the skull to which the 8,601 flawless diamonds were attached. However, all these diamonds are truly secondary to the enormous 52.40 carat flawless light fancy pink, brilliant-cut, pear-shaped diamond that is the final work’s centerpiece.

And the cost of this piece at auction?

$100 million

But what does this mean? Isn't art supposed to be used to convey something? Isn't the purpose of art to somehow comment on society and the times we live in... well folks Richard Dorment, art critic of the Daily Telegraph, I think, stated the meaning of this piece best:

"If anyone but Hurst had made this curious object, we would be struck by its vulgarity.[...] But not just anyone made it - Hurst did. Knowing this, we look at it in a different way and realize that in the most brutal, direct way possible, For the Love of God questions something about the morality of art and money."

If you are familiar with Hurst and his art you would expect nothing less. Death is a central theme in Hurst's works. Now that I think of it Hurst is just the thing to look at this close to Halloween, with his perfectly preserved dead animals, sliced up, torn apart, and dissected. Check him out if that sparks your curiosity.