Hirst vs. Hockney – a feud over use of assistants

English artist Damien Hirst in a still image from the 2010 documentary ‘The Future of Art’ by Erik Niedling and Ingo Niermann. Image supplied by Christian Gomer, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
The argument pits painter David Hockney, just awarded Britain’s prestigious Order of Merit, against conceptual artist Damien Hirst.
Hockney uses the poster for his upcoming Royal Academy show to state that all the works on exhibit were “made by the artist himself.”
Radio Times magazine reported Tuesday that Hockney said in an interview that the comment was directed at Hirst, who has used assistants to help create some of his most famous pieces.
Hirst has said his assistants do a better painting job than he could and that he becomes easily bored. He is best known for suspending a shark in formaldehyde and covering a human skull with more than 8,000 diamonds.
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ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

English artist Damien Hirst in a still image from the 2010 documentary ‘The Future of Art’ by Erik Niedling and Ingo Niermann. Image supplied by Christian Gomer, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.