Hirst's Golden Calf Sells for Record-Breaking $18 Million

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed)
Sep 15th 2008 at 6:05PM

Bad boy Brit artist Damien Hirst smashed his previous auction record with the $18.5 million sale of a gold tipped bull in formaldehyde on the first day of his major solo sale at Sotheby's in London Monday. Entitled The Golden Calf, the controversial artist's work exceeded the top end of its estimate by over $4 million, and toppled the previous record of $17.4 million paid for a Hirst work last summer, Bloomberg reports. The buyer's identity is unknown at this time.

Elsewhere in day one of the sale, a shark in formaldehyde work entitled The Kingdom was hammered down for $17.2 million - over $7 million above the high end of its pre-sale estimate. The piece in question is about half the size of the pickled shark which was sold to billionaire Steven Cohen for $8 million in 2005. The figures have many in the contemporary art world breathing a sigh of relief, as the landmark auction is seen as a bellwether of the much-hyped market's prospects in an uncertain economy.

Tags: Contemporary art, ContemporaryArt, Damien Hirst, DamienHirst, Sothebys

Filed under: Auctions, Art

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Graffitimonkie Sep 15th 2008 8:51PM

What kind of art is that?

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willzville Sep 16th 2008 1:32AM

I think it looks horrible! Am I the only person that thinks that a work of art shouldn't be judged by the price of the materials it's made of?

Hirst's work all involve using expensive materials one way or another - this just means that he needs money in materials to compensate for the lack of actual talent.