Vol. 160 / No. 1379
Vol. 160 / No. 1379
One of the most
intriguing narratives in contemporary British art is the steady transformation
of Damien Hirst from enfant terrible into Grand Old Man. Few contemporary
artists have placed themselves so unequivocally in the old-master tradition. Early
works such as A thousand years (1990), a vitrine containing a cow’s head,
maggots and flies, demonstrated an engagement with themes of mortality and
decay that have a long ancestry in Western art, as the exhibition of the work alongside
five triptychs by Francis Bacon at the Gagosian Gallery, London, in 2006, made
strikingly obvious.1 He followed this up with a display of his paintings at the
Wallace Collection, London, in 2009–10 and the gargantuan faux-archaeological assembly
Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable shown last year at Palazzo Grassi
and the Punta della Dogana, Venice.2 This is the background to last month’s
announcement that the old-master paintings at Houghton Hall, Norfolk, are to be
temporarily displaced by fifty of Hirst’s new Colour Space works, a development
of his spot paintings. They will be accompanied both inside and outside the
house by six of his sculptures.3
Although this is the first time that Hirst’s works have been
shown in the setting of a historic country house, there is a precedent on both
sides. Hirst himself owns a large country house, Toddington Manor in
Gloucestershire, which when restored will contain a gallery for his collection,
and since 2000 the Marquess of Cholmondeley, owner of Houghton Hall, has been
acquiring an impressive group of contemporary sculptures for the garden and
park, including a Skyspace by James Turrell and works by Rachel Whiteread and
Richard Long. Nor is the use of a private historic house for temporary
installations of contemporary art especially novel – a programme of such events
at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, launched in 2014, has included works by
Laurence Weiner and Jenny Holzer.
The display of contemporary art in historic settings, and in
particular in the context of historic art collections, has become commonplace
in museums and galleries throughout the world, many of whom now have dedicated
curatorial staff for the purpose. Although such initiatives are usually justified
in terms of creating links between the increasingly divergent cultures of
contemporary and historic art, there often seems to be an assumption that
contemporary art is coming to the rescue of traditional art museums by
introducing a youthfulness and energy that are presumed to be lacking. If
establishing links between the new and old is really the aim, why do museums of
contemporary art not regularly stage installations of old-master paintings and
sculpture?
Yet although the appearance of contemporary art in
traditional museums occasionally attracts criticism, it is usually directed
towards the artist rather than the institution – Hirst received some of the
worst reviews of his career for his exhibition at the Wallace Collection –
perhaps because it falls within a clearly understood remit of what galleries
do, which includes staging exhibitions. In private houses open to the public,
as at Houghton or Blenheim, such initiatives are largely accepted as the prerogative
of their owners. There is more space for contention if contemporary art is
placed in a context that is, or is perceived to be, publicly owned. The most
extreme example of this was the strong objections to the installation of Anish Kapoor’s
Dirty corner in the park at Versailles in 2016, which were manifested in the
vandalism of the sculpture. Nothing in the United Kingdom has provoked that
level of controversy, but the ambitious programmes of commissions and loans of
contemporary art staged every year at the historic sites and houses owned by
the National Trust and English Heritage have on occasion attracted vehement
private criticism from the institutions’ staff as well as visitors.
The commitment of such organisations as the National Trust to
these programmes suggests that they must bring substantial benefits. Yet
although, for example, an installation by Luke Jerram is credited by the
National Trust with a 140 per cent increase in visitors to Nostell Priory,
Yorkshire, last year, there is a striking lack of published empirical evidence
about the impact of such initiatives on their audiences. That will change with
the completion next year of a three-year project ‘Mapping contemporary art in
the heritage experience: creation, consumption and exchange’ at Newcastle
University. A collaboration between several organisations, including the
National Trust, the Churches Conservation Trust, Arts Council England and the
Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Newcastle, this ‘will explore in detail how
contemporary artists engage with heritage narratives and how these artworks are
received and consumed by visitors’. The project, which will encompass an
international conference, will involve ‘the production of a new online resource
that develops, expands and digitises an existing audit of such projects making
this publicly available as a platform for further professional exchange’.
Presumably this project will include an analysis of the
degree to which such initiatives fulfil what is often stated to be their primary
purpose, to attract younger audiences. It should also be an opportunity to
reflect on some fundamental issues. As with museums and galleries, the
popularity of contemporary art as a strategy for drawing visitors to historic
properties can suggest a patronising lack of confidence in both the innate
ability of the art of the past to engage and excite and the skills of curators
to interpret it. The insight of artists into the work of their predecessors is often
of interest but is no substitute for historical understanding. Although this is
a well-understood objection, less attention has been paid to the implications
for contemporary art of using it as at best an instrument for interpreting
historic art and at worst a marketing tool. As Damien Hirst for one well
understands, if contemporary art is of value, it is of value for itself and not
for what it can do to refresh the image of heritage organisations.
1 Reviewed by Sarah Whitfield in this Magazine, 138 (2006),
pp.643–45.
2 Reviewed by James Cahill in this Magazine, 149 (2017),
pp.848–49.
3 Damien Hirst at Houghton Hall: Colour Space Paintings and
Outdoor Sculptures, 25th March–15th July. The exhibition is part of the visual
arts programme of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival.