Introduction

In September 2008, as the financial markets in London and New York went into freefall, the British auction house Sotheby's held a two-day sale of 263 works by the British artist Damien Hirst. Despite an economy that was by all accounts heading into recession, the Hirst sale realised £111 million, far exceeding the £63 million which was estimated. Many cultural critics, art historians and academics find Damien Hirst's financial success baffling. But there is little doubt that as the highest-paid living artist to date, an examination of the Damien Hirst phenomenon can tell us much about the current state of British art. Rather than regarding Hirst's spectacular success as the product of individual genius, this chapter will examine the social, political and economic conditions that made that success possible. By doing so, it will also cast light on the fundamental changes that have occurred in the relationship between art and society in contemporary Britain and will consider how those changes have affected the kind of art that is produced.

Although Britain has produced a number of significant artists over the centuries, it has never managed to achieve the status of either Paris or New York as a wellspring of modern art. This is largely due to a modernist tendency to understand art history as a linear evolution of recognizable styles such as cubism or abstract expressionism. Despite the fact that Britain sends a higher proportion of its population to art school than any other European country, British art has proved difficult to categorise. The fact that the art colleges are located all over the country, rather than centred in London, has fostered a certain regionalism and, concomitantly, a broad range of styles and interests such as narrative and landscape, whether urban or rural. While individual artists such as Henry Moore, Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud among others have achieved international recognition, they tend to be considered exceptions to the perceived insularity of British art rather than as part of a recognizable school, movement or style.