Damien Hirst to Take Over the Entire Château La Coste Estate
Hirst will be the first artist to take over the entire estate with his upcoming exhibition.
Damien Hirst isn’t known for his subtlety—the British artist has publicly burnt his artwork in an incinerator, encrusted human skulls with diamonds and preserved animals in formaldehyde. Now, Hirst is bringing some of his most well-known works to a sprawling and biodynamic 500-acre vineyard in the South of France.
Between March and June of next year, the Young British Artist (YBA) heavyweight will be the first artist to take over the entire Château La Coste estate. The show has been in the works for years, according to the vineyard and art destination’s founder Paddy McKillen, an Irish hotelier and property developer. “Amid laughs and giggles, chats and cups of tea, great ideas evolved as they do when Damien is his playful self,” said McKillen in a statement.
What is Château La Coste?
Located between Aix-En-Provence and the Luberon National Park, Château La Coste opened to the public in 2011 as a vineyard, architectural marvel and sculpture park rolled into one. More than 40 contemporary site-specific installations from the likes of Sophie Calle, Louise Bourgeois and Tracey Emin dot its vast estate and exhibition pavilions, which were designed by renowned architects from Renzo Piano to Oscar Niemeyer.
For his upcoming show The Light That Shines, Hirst planned where each work would be displayed in different areas of the estate. A site designed by Richard Rogers, for example, will host the artist’s first-ever showing of The Empress Paintings, a series of kaleidoscopic patterns made up of butterfly wings and named after historical female rulers.
Another group of new showings from Hirst will take place at a winehouse by Jean-Michel Wilmotte. Inspired by images from the Hubble Space Telescope, Hirst’s Cosmos Paintings consist of black canvases overlaid with paint and will be joined by bronze and glass works from the artist’s Meteorites and Satellites series.
The artist’s infamous formaldehyde works, including the calf from his 2003 The Ascension, will go on view in the estate’s Renzo Piano Pavilion, while sculptures and lightboxes from the artist’s 2017 Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable will be placed in the Oscar Niemeyer auditorium. One of the artist’s more recent projects, a series of colorful and paint-splattered flower works unveiled at Frieze London earlier this year, will be presented at Château La Coste’s Bastide Gallery, while a selection of outdoor sculptures will be placed across its Frank Gehry Music Pavilion and Tadao Ando Art Centre.
The vineyard has long been a site for daring art. In addition to current solo shows displaying the work of Marguerite Piard, Tia-Thuy Nguyen and Makoto Ofune, the French destination has previously unveiled works from artists ranging from Jean-Michel Basquiat to Bob Dylan. But Hirst’s show will mark the first time that an artist has occupied all of Chäteau La Coste’s exhibition spaces.
This isn’t the first time Hirst has worked with McKillen—he designed a grand bronze chapel for the vineyard back in 2020. The estate’s founder is a “great friend,” one that “makes the most amazing places for people to be,” said Hirst in a statement. “I’m so happy to be a part of Paddy’s vision.”