Damien Hirst Quotes & Sayings (Page 3)

“The spot paintings and spin paintings were trying to find mechanical ways to make paintings.”

“I'm 43. I'm not ready to sit down in a chair with my name on it yet.”

“It's amazing what you can do with an E in A-Level art, a twisted imagination and a chainsaw.”

“You need a big ego to be an artist.”

“I think an ashtray is the most fantastically real thing.”

“Museums are for dead artists. I'd never show my work in the Tate. You'd never get me in that place.”

“I think I've always been afraid of painting, really. Right from the beginning. All my paintings are about painting without a painter. Like a kind of mechanical form of painting.”

“I was brought up Catholic, and I felt the power of art from a very young age - seeing the brutality of all those images of flayed apostles and tortured saints was a pretty strong introduction.”

“'Painting like a child' isn't a negative for me... it's something only great artists can really achieve. The childlike quality of some of Picasso's drawings is precisely what makes them so masterful and extraordinary; the ability to express complete visions, feelings and portraits through a continuous line.”

“I've been asked to do a retrospective since I was about 28 and I always thought that was a bit odd. It's great to look forward as an artist because in the future the possibilities are infinite; you look back and it's all fixed so it's a scary thing.”