218 Quotes by Damien Hirst

You’ve really got to get down on the floor with yourself and get low in order to make great art. I think you’ve just got to accept who you are and do the most unbelievable things.

I have titles floating around in my head; I have sculptures floating around in my head. It’s like a collage.

Death’s just something that inspires me, not something that pulls me down. I used to get called morbid at school. I have always loved horror films; I like being frightened.

I mean, people listen to music, and they like that, but I think in England, a lot of people don’t like contemporary art.

Art goes on in your head. If you said something interesting, that might be a title for a work of art and I’d write it down.

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. Like finding some imaginary computer painter, or a robot who paints.

You’ve got to be oblivious to other people, the push and pull of other people’s opinions, the way other people measure success. It’s then that you realize you are 100 percent who you are and you have to use that who-you-are 100 percent in order to create great things.

I don’t think I’d want my pet in formaldehyde, but I guess in America they would.

I used to believe I was going to live forever. And then you suddenly become aware that you’re not.