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Damien Hirst Shark Byte
by Estep Nagy


The Brooklyn Museum of Art

Controversy recently erupted in New York over some of the works in the Brooklyn Museum's recent exhibition Sensation: New British Art.


Damien Hirst

One of the most talked-about pieces is The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, by Damien Hirst, which consists of a (dead) Great White shark suspended in a tank of formaldehyde.


A Great White shark

As you can imagine, it wasn't easy to find a Great White in the artist's native England, so Hirst faxed 'Shark Wanted' signs to all the towns on the Australian coast, the world's most active Great White breeding ground.


*The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living*

Eventually, a natural history museum happened to have an extra beast that matched the artist's description, and they shipped him to England at a cost of $30,000!!

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