YBA | Roland's Ragbag

*Verity’ by Damien Hirst, Ilfracombe, Devon … Photograph … WHB – 2015*

‘VERITY’ is the name given to a stainless steel and bronze statue created by Damien Hirst, the English artist, entrepreneur, and art collector. He is the most prominent member of the group known as the Young British Artists, who dominated the art scene in the UK during the 1990s.

The 20.25-metre tall sculpture stands on the pier at the entrance to the harbour in Ilfracombe, Devon, looking out over the Bristol Channel towards South Wales. Hirst lives close to the town. He describes his work as a “modern allegory of truth and justice”. The statue depicts a pregnant woman holding aloft a sword while carrying the scales of justice and standing on a pile of law books. Half of the sculpture shows the internal anatomy of the pregnant woman, with the foetus clearly visible. (adapted from Wikipedia)

VERITY

Pregnant,
Opened up, exposed,
Exhibit Number One

I am birth corroborated,
Prying eyes sated,
Privacy crushed

Paraded for the populace
To ponder,
To pity

They ogle,
Excoriate,
Turn witty

Solicitudes are rare;
Their taunts I bear;
Reproofs I must abide

And yet, I am the truth
About how it is
To be free

My brandished threat
Repays the debt
My innocence holds

My stance, defiance,
Thwarts compliance,
Demands a voice

But to keep hope alive,
Live long, survive,
I must be exposed

Must confront
The brutal sea,
The relentless incoming tide

No chance repose;
What end my woes;
Torment inside

My frightened stare
Torches the tides,
Seeking solace

Whilst emblazoned in light
Against the torrid sky
The world gawps

I must bear
The stares
And cry

I am torn apart;
My pain is there
For all to see.

In a world that demands
To know,
To know everything

The truth is there
For all to see,
To verify that I
Am VERITY

*‘Verity’ by Damien Hirst, Ilfracombe, Devon … Photo WHB – 2015*

A Clerihew is a comic verse consisting of two couplets and a specific rhyming scheme, aabb. It was invented by Edmund Clerihew Bentley (1875-1956) at the age of 16. Normally the first line names a person, and the second line ends with something that rhymes with the name of the person. (From: ‘Shadow Poetry’).

Since Damien Stephen Hurst
Onto the YBA scene he burst,
With dead sheep and bejewelled skull,
Artsy Life has never been dull.

David Hockney RA
Is top-of-the-pile I would say.
His reds, his blues and his greens
Are just bursting out of his scenes.

I sing of Sir Stanley Spencer,
Painter of Cookham’s splendour.
May his ‘Resurrection’
Inspire introspection.

N.B. The Young British Artists, or YBAs^[1]—also referred to as Brit artists and Britart—is a loose group of visual artists who first began to exhibit together in London in 1988. Many of the first generation of YBA artists graduated from the BA Fine Art course at Goldsmiths, in the late 1980s, while the second generation mostly came from the Royal College of Art. (Wikipedia)