
Another shark (a female aged about 25–30 years, equivalent to middle age) was caught off the Queensland coast and shipped to Hirst in a 2-month journey. When Hirst learned of Saatchi's impending sale of the work to Cohen, he offered to replace the shark, an operation which Cohen funded, calling the expense "inconsequential" (the formaldehyde process alone cost around $100,000). Hirst commented, "It didn't look as frightening.
GIANT BOULDER OF DEATH TRICERO TANKS SKIN
In 1993 the gallery skinned the shark and stretched its skin over a fiberglass mould, thus transforming the shark from a chemically preserved intact carcass to a taxidermy mount being displayed in fluid. Hirst attributed some of the decay to the fact that the Saatchi Gallery had added bleach to the fluid. Decay and replacement īecause the shark was initially preserved poorly, it began to deteriorate, and the surrounding liquid grew murky. It gives the innately demonic urge to live a demonic, deathlike form. In keeping with the piece's title, the shark is simultaneously life and death incarnate in a way you don't quite grasp until you see it, suspended and silent, in its tank. Hirst often aims to fry the mind (and misses more than he hits), but he does so by setting up direct, often visceral experiences, of which the shark remains the most outstanding. The New York Times in 2007 gave the following description of the artwork: Its technical specifications are: "Tiger shark, glass, steel, 5% formaldehyde solution, 213 × 518 × 213 cm." Saatchi sold the work in 2004 to Steven A. He was then nominated for the Turner Prize, but it was awarded to Grenville Davey. The British tabloid newspaper The Sun ran a story titled "£50,000 for fish without chips." The show also included Hirst's artwork A Thousand Years.
GIANT BOULDER OF DEATH TRICERO TANKS SERIES
It was first exhibited in 1992 in the first of a series of Young British Artists shows at the Saatchi Gallery, then at its premises in St John's Wood, north London. ĭeath Denied (2008) part of a later artwork, exhibited in Kiev It is considered an iconic work of British art in the 1990s, and has become a symbol of Britart worldwide.

It was on loan to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City from 2007 to 2010. Owing to deterioration of the original 14-foot (4.3 m) tiger shark, it was replaced with a new specimen in 2006. However, the title of Don Thompson's book, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art, suggests a higher figure. Cohen for an undisclosed amount, widely reported to have been at least $8 million. It was originally commissioned in 1991 by Charles Saatchi, who sold it in 2004 to Steven A. It consists of a preserved tiger shark submerged in formaldehyde in a glass-panel display case. The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living is an artwork created in 1991 by Damien Hirst, an English artist and a leading member of the " Young British Artists" (or YBA).
