The project was 10 years in the making and reputedly cost Hirst $65 million of his own money. He produced a fictional "documentary", Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable, to accompany his exhibition.
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Mythology
It mocked up the moment when the many treasures were apparently removed from the Unbelievable on the sea bed. The fictional documentary was shown on Netflix, while Hirst's massive exhibition of treasures made its debut spread over two Italian museums, Punta della Dogana and Palazzo Grassi, in Venice, in April 2017.
Hirst used a spectacular mix of storytelling, mythology, humour and invention. He created the amazing array of artefacts, comprising hundreds of objects crafted from gold, marble, bronze, jade, crystal and malachite, depicting heroes and gods that supposedly date from a lost civilisation.
The monumental exhibits include a life-size statue of a man on a horse constricted by a giant snake, outside the Punta della Dogana. Other creations include a sword-wielding woman riding a giant bronze bear, a huge calendar stone apparently made by the Aztecs, mighty warriors and sphinxes.
Hirst has reproduced the legendary shield of Achilles from his imagination. It has apparently been lost for thousands of years. He has also invented ancient currencies that have never been seen before.
One of the most hideous tableau, carved from lapis lazuli, depicts the mythical character Andromeda chained to a rock and being menaced by a giant shark, as well as a sea monster.
Demon with Bowl
A gigantic and terrifying statue, called Demon with Bowl, stands in the centre of the exhibition, with bulbous eyes and gaping jaws on its detached head. Standing more than 18 metres tall, the statue was painstakingly reconstructed in the museum.
A time-lapse video documents how it was constructed, building it up and fitting together the huge parts of the giant statue within the tall but narrow atrium space of the Grassi. It was based on William Blake’s The Ghost of a Flea - a painting dating from around 1819 or 1820 on display at the Tate Gallery.
Hirst's imposing Demon with Bowl is the 3D interpretation of the character depicted in Blake's painting. Once assembled in the museum, it had a clearance space of just 15cm above the figure.
Story
The exhibition comes with its own detailed story, suggesting that the collection of treasures on the ancient wreck of the vast ship had belonged to Aulus Calidius Amotan. He was a freed slave, also known as Cif Amotan II. The artefacts had been on their way to a temple dedicated to the sun when the ship sank.
A bust said to be Amotan, covered in barnacles and sea anemones, forms part of the exhibition. Hirst has created the treasures in minute detail, showing them first in what is said to be their original state, eroded and barnacled, as if just taken from the sea.
Then, in the second half of the exhibition, the same objects reappear, except this time they look to be in pristine condition. Any damage has been repaired and the figures' missing limbs have been restored. They look as they would have when they formed the priceless collection of the wealthy Amotan.
There are also smaller, scaled-down artefacts, created in gold and rock crystal, which are described as "baubles".
Controversy
Hirst is no stranger to creating unusual exhibitions, which have often courted controversy. Born in Bristol in 1965, he began studying Fine Art at Goldsmiths college in 1986. He became one of a handful of young British artists who dominated the art scene throughout the 1990s.
Famous for his series of artworks featuring dead animals (including a sheep, a cow and a shark) preserved in formaldehyde and sometimes dissected, his work was often criticised not only by the mainstream art world but also by animal rights campaigners.
In 2008, he sold his complete show, Beautiful Inside My Head Forever, at Sotheby's for £111 million - a record for a solo artist's auction. His record for the sale of one piece of artwork was The Golden Calf - a dead calf preserved in formaldehyde with 18-carat gold hooves and horns, which was auctioned for £10.3 million. He won the Turner Prize in 1995 and today, his net worth is estimated to be around $300 million.
Treasure from the Wreck of the Unbelievable spanned a floor area of 5,000 square metres and marked the first time that the two Venetian venues had been dedicated jointly to the work of a single artist.
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