Damien Hirst preview at Leeds City Art Gallery.

My mum always used to tell me that it would be a dull world if we all liked the same things. She’d trot out this phrase regularly every time I wanted to turn off Coronation Street, every time I tried to get her to buy brown bread instead of white, every time I demanded vegetable oil not lard. She’d repeat it as she slid a greasy, doughy chip butty in front of me and then plopped down in front of the telly to watch her favourite soap. I grew up agreeing with mum’s theory even though much of her practice was typically in bad faith. It would certainly be a dull world if we all liked Damien Hirst.

I’m saying this because I was one of a bunch of bloggers invited to a preview of the new Hirst exhibition at the Leeds Art Gallery, and probably the only one who didn’t find it an unalloyed joy. Before I went to the preview I expressed some indifference to Hirst’s work – I think it must be a taste thing, and there’s no accounting for that I suppose – and, secretly, I had enjoyed the negative reviews he’s been getting ever since the Sotherby Auction and that silly skull business (Google Guardian critics, Jonathan Jones and Adrian Searle, or watch the crusty old curmudgeon Robert Hughes for a magisterial dismissal.) So, I admit to going along not entirely open-minded, but willing to be convinced.

I found the tour of the show fascinating. We got a real behind-the-scenes look at how something of this importance is put together, the sheer physical effort and organisational coordination involved (the formaldehyde sheep is a transportation nightmare apparently, and some of those cabinets are formidably heavy, walls and floors have to be reinforced.) There were massive crates still unpacked, bits and pieces waiting to be assembled, and guys in overalls doing stuff that guys in overalls do. Everyone who went along found the atmosphere genuinely thrilling.

But what about the work?

The first object we were introduced to was a photograph. A 16 year old Hirst in a mortuary (or was it a pathology lab) bent over, grinning next to a severed head on a table, or maybe it was a trolley. Hirst had sneaked into St James’ to muck about with the corpses. Something I’m sure, in our more macabre moments, we’ve all been tempted to do. We were told that Hirst didn’t show this picture in an exhibition till ten years later. Time enough, I would have thought, to reconsider his adolescent prank? My first response on seeing this image, in the company of people I know to be right thinking, liberal lefty, arty types (just like me) was to imagine the photograph reframed slightly; instead of cheeky chappy, rule-breaking, taboo-defying, society-snooking artist we’d been told that the smirking face of the intruder in the hospital belonged to a tabloid journalist . . . I’m guessing there would have been less reverential awe in the room and maybe a bit more outrage? But then, art plays by different moral rules. Doesn’t it?

The next piece was a pair of large black canvasses with painted skulls. Again, not really my taste (reminded me of some really bad heavy metal t-shirts I’ve seen to be honest) but I didn’t have as bad a reaction as some proper art critics. Hirst painted these himself, I believe, and his skills with a brush haven’t met with universal acclaim – in fact, the only positive thing I could find was from a Stuckist, and I’m not sure if he was taking the piss or not.

Next was the famous sheep. This did elicit the most oohs and aahs from the assembled bloggers, and the most favourable comment. It seemed to evoke thoughts of Love and Death and Nurture and Motherhood – in fact a whole host of capitalised concepts. I have to admit the thing was rather charming, and the unfortunate beast did have the most endearing expression – though, if you think about it, how would you look submerged in a vat of preservative? It may suit you. I can’t say that the sheep stimulated much in the way of complex cogitation in my brain I’m afraid. I’m not against art that’s full of ideas, it’s just that I like my ideas to be . . . erm, well, ideas. I think the main problem for me is that I went to school in a building that was full of taxidermy. Over every door and nailed to random walls about the place were glass cases crammed with owls and voles and foxes and even one large ram! pests, vermin, and various semi-domesticated animals stuffed and displayed for the edification and enlightenment of small, impressionable children. After that experience I guess one has built up a tolerance for ghoulish wit.

I can’t really say much about the butterfly paintings. They were paintings of butterflies. Baffled me.

The statue of the angel was popular. Carved out of cool, pure white stone and impossibly smooth, she had the trade mark Hirst deformities; the skin on half her face and right breast were peeled back and there was a hefty chunk carved out of her thigh, revealing a large leg bone. My first thought was to wonder if angels had internal structures and meant to ask Jon Beech – he’d certainly have known – but got distracted by a conversation about the spot pictures.

Someone asked what I thought the spot picture meant. I fabricated a convincing answer – I’m sure I mentioned Foucault and systems of classification, or at least I meant to – but really I don’t have a clue.

We spent some time perusing the contents of the three medical cabinets – must admit, these were my favourites, though I couldn’t adequately explain why right now – then went into a different gallery space where they were setting up the Pharmacy exhibition. First I thought this was interesting, then I thought it wasn’t; then I thought I didn’t know what to think. It felt quite weird to be in a gallery that was becoming a very exclusive restaurant, a place when it existed most of us there would have been excluded from on simple economic grounds. Most of the bloggers wanted a bit of the wallpaper though. The wallpaper was rather special; again, John attempted to explain the exact reason for the specialness – there was some religious significance to the imagery, some quotes from the bible, though it would not have been noticeable by any punter without a magnifying glass. Not that that’s any criticism.

I left the gallery happy to have seen what’s going on and glad that Leeds will get to see something that not many cities can boast, but also perplexed. I think for me the clue is in the Pharmacy room. Economics. Before I went to the preview I watched the Sotherby auction on YouTube (Beautiful Inside My Head Forever.) It’s actually much more exciting than any of the objects; that’s the point of Damian Hirst I think, and probably why old guard establishment art critics are so snooty. I’m not sure if I get it. I’m certainly not sure if I like it. But I think I agree with Germaine Greer when she argued against Robert Hughes that “artists no longer make things.” I’ll end with a long quote, she says it better than I ever could;

Hirst is quite frank about what he doesn’t do. He doesn’t paint his triumphantly vacuous spot paintings – the best spot paintings by Damien Hirst are those painted by Rachel Howard. His undeniable genius consists in getting people to buy them. Damien Hirst is a brand, because the art form of the 21st century is marketing. To develop so strong a brand on so conspicuously threadbare a rationale is hugely creative – revolutionary even. The whole stupendous gallimaufrey is a Vanitas, a reminder of futility and entropy. Hughes still believes that great art can be guaranteed to survive the ravages of time, because of its intrinsic merit. Hirst knows better. The prices his work fetches are verifications of his main point; they are not the point. No one knows better than Hirst that consumers of his work are incapable of getting that point. His dead cow is a lineal descendant of the Golden Calf. Hughes is sensitive enough to pick up the resonance. “One might as well be in Forest Lawn [the famous LA cemetery] contemplating a loved one,” he shouts at Hirst’s calf with the golden hooves – auctioned for £9.2m – but does not realise it is Hirst who has put that idea into his head. Instead he asserts that there is no resonance in Hirst’s work. Bob dear, the Sotheby’s auction was the work.