The exhibition takes its title from the central sculpture in the exhibition, a severed bull's head with golden horns and crowned with a solid gold disc. Suspended in formaldehyde and encased in a golden vitrine, this totemic sculpture acts as a powerful coda to “The Golden Calf” (2008).
“End of An Era” proffers a sacrificial head, here dismembered from the majestic body of the earlier sculpture. While “The Golden Calf” symbolized the worshipping of a false idol, with “End Of An Era” (2009) Hirst demystifies the biblical tale and, by extension, debunks his own myth-making.
Also included in the exhibition is “Judgement Day” (2009) a thirty-foot long gold cabinet filled with close to 30,000 manufactured diamonds. A series of photorealist paintings of famous diamonds including “The Golden Jubilee” (2008), “The Agra” (2006) and “The Premiere Rose” (2006) are shown together here for the first time.
Having recently announced the end of the various series for which he has become known over the last twenty years, including the spot, spin and butterfly paintings, Hirst also makes reference with the exhibition's title to the seachange in his own work.
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