Damien Hirst has taken spot painting to the next level in a new series of works created in pointillist style blobs of vividly coloured paint that he describes as “big abstract Bonnard paintings”.
The “veil paintings” are due to go on show at Larry Gagosian’s Los Angeles space on 1 March (until 14 April), in what will be Hirst’s first exhibition with the mega-dealer since returning to the gallery in 2016. His last show there was The Complete Spot Paintings in 2012.
But the former YBA has already given onlookers a private view of his latest vibrant canvases on Instagram. Hirst describes how he was inspired as a student by a show of works by Willem de Kooning and Pierre Bonnard at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. “Both artists blew me away,” he says. “I’ve always loved Bonnard and his colour. How can you not love colour? Sunlight on flowers, fuck everything else.”
Not one to eschew an egalitarian approach to art, Hirst likens the surface of the works to Iced Gems biscuits, a childhood favourite for British children growing up in the 1970s and 1980s. “The texture of these paintings reminds me of some sweets I used to get from my gran as a kid,” he says. “They were in a bag like crisps and were a dollop of brightly coloured icing sugar squeezed from an icing bag on a small round tasteless biscuit base.” Read more