Damien Hirst: A Retrospective

The survey began in April 1988 as interviews with artists jewellers, fashion designers and furniture restorers, based at Old Loom House in Whitechapel, launching a quarterly review Cv Journal of Art and Crafts. Cv Journal was published to 1992 and the collection of interviews and features provided the foundation of the Cv/Visual Arts Research archive and subsequent publications. Cv/VAR series 146 reviews the work of Damien Hirst (b.Bristol 1965) presented in a retrospective exhibition spanning twenty years, held at Tate Modern, April to September 2012. It explores the development of his art from the controversial animal vitrines and beautiful butterfly composites to an extensive series of spot paintings, where the artist engaged in a complex invigilation of coded systems that govern daily existence. With contributions by Marina Vaizey and James Cahill, it encounters a rarely exhibited work One Thousand Years, Mother and Child, Crematorium, Pharmacy and For The Love of God, the diamond studded skull.