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Hirst

November 10th, 2022

Damien Hirst, whose own painting skills have been described by the Independent Newspaper as "at about the level of a not-very-promising, first-year art student" is somehow another of the darlings of today's fine Art market. Claiming a fascination with death, his dead animals dipped in formaldehyde were considered ground-breaking when they were first exhibited. Yawn. When he reverted to painting his mediocre "No Love Lost" show at the Wallace Collection Gallery in London in 2009 was rightly ridiculed by the critics, who more often than not are happy to jump on the Hirst bandwagon. But this setback did not derail Hirst. His idiotic spot paintings, executed by assistants, were deemed important enough for the Gagosian Gallery to exhibit them simultaneously in 2012 at all 11 Gagosian galleries scattered throughout the world. Oooohh, thanks Larry. Then there was Hirst's next Gagosian show "Veil Paintings in March of 2018, when his spots morphed into pointalism, with Hirst actually bragging about having painted each work himself, without the help of assistants, what a thing to boast about. Needless to say the show sold out prior to the opening. Hirst has since been peddling his colored spot paintings at Gagosian, and his sculptures created by studio assistants and all sorts of other nonsense that confuse the viewer as to what qualifies as visual Art. Jesus. Hirst is another YBA - Young British Artist

Emin

November 10th, 2022

As overrated sacred cow visual Artist celebrities go, Britain's Tracy Emin is among the most mediocre. She can't draw and she can't paint, but that didn't stop London's Royal Academy of Arts succumbing to the lure of celebrity by appointing her as professor of drawing in 2011. It soon came out that she had just recently been taking drawing lessons in New York, LOL. Emin was one of the infamous YBAs—Young British Artists—born in the 1960s—most of them mediocre—championed by the entrepreneur Charles Saatchi. Tracey Emin came to wide public notice in 1997 when she showed up drunk on a live Channel 4 TV chat show discussion about the Turner Art prize. She made a fool of herself, slurring her words and talking nonsense, but a star was born. The visual Art establishment had become obsessed with the notion of shock and sensation, they had anointed their champion. Representative and figurative Art was no longer en vogue. Then came My Bed, Emin's unmade bed installation which was shortlisted for the Turner Art Prize. Yawn. My Bed has since been sold by Christies for $2.5 million. Her other seminal work "Everyone I Have Ever Slept With 1963–1995" was a tent the inside of which sloppily displayed the names of everyone she ever slept with. Sadly this priceless masterpiece was destroyed in a warehouse fire in 2004. She has since been involved in painting, sculpture, photography, film, whatever, and these neon messages, but I cannot imagine that its Tracy who bends the glass. She likes to play the celebrity, gives a lot of interviews, but she can't draw. A star of London's White Cube Gallery, Emin's suggestive scribbles deserve to be ignored. But if you have swallowed the cool aid and have bought into this mediocrity, then you have been played, like all of the other Art world sycophants who think that its a sign of sophistication to be in touch with the Art world.