The resin version of Damien Hirst’s Demon with Bowl (2014) on view at the Palazzo Grassi in Venice.
PALMS CASINO RESORT
Demon with Bowl (2014) has found a home.
Las Vegas’s Palms Casino Resort said today that it has acquired the headless centerpiece of Damien Hirst’s extravagant 2017 exhibition at collector François Pinault’s Palazzo Grassi museum in Venice, Italy.
The nearly 60-foot-tall bronze work will be on view in the hotel’s new pool, which is set to open in the spring, and its installation is currently underway.
A press rep for the Palms declined to provide a price for the sale. However, at the time of Hirst’s show in the Most Serene Republic, which was titled “Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable” and also filled Pinault’s nearby Punta della Dogana in its entirety, ARTnewsreported that the bronze version of the work had a price tag of $14 million.
(An important caveat: the work on view in Venice was actually made of resin, since the metal version was reportedly too difficult to ship. The Palms rep said that the resin work was made because the bronze would have been too heavy for the Palazzo Grassi, and that the resin version has since been destroyed.)
The demon will be in fine company at the Palms, which is already home to a bar designed by Hirst called Unknown that sports a number of his artworks, including a shark in formaldehyde and some of his “Spot” paintings.
Update, January 4: This post has been updated with confirmation that the Palms acquired the bronze version of the work, and that the resin piece has been destroyed.