Name: The Cure (bubblegum pink, Payne's grey, iceberg blue)
Brand: Damien Hirst
Rating: 4.9 (183 reviews)

Meaning & Analysis

The Cure (bubblegum pink, Payne's grey, iceberg blue) is a silkscreen print by Damien Hirst on Somerset Tub. Produced in 2014, the print shows a two-colour pill, rendered by Hirst in Payne’s grey and iceberg blue against a pale bubblegum pink backdrop. These bold and vibrant colours resonate with the Pop Art style popularised by Andy Warhol in the 1960s. On the top half of the pill, Hirst writes ‘this end up’ in faded, capitalised letters, accompanied by an arrow pointing upwards.

read more about The Cure

The Cure (bubblegum pink, Payne's grey, iceberg blue) is one of thirty silkscreen prints that compose Hirst’s The Cure series. In this series, Hirst renders a singular pill in a combination of two colour tones against a bold and vibrant coloured backdrop. The series is based on the minimalist aesthetic of the medicinal pill which, despite its simple appearance, behaves in an extremely complex and ingenious way. Hirst has a long-standing interest in medicine and pharmaceuticals. In his Eat the Rich series, produced later in 2017, Hirst further develops this interest by depicting tablet boxes and pharmaceutical packaging, instead of simply focussing on the pharmaceutical products themselves, as he does in The Cure series.

The Cure (bubblegum pink, Payne's grey, iceberg blue) reflects Hirst’s fascination with modern society’s obsession with science, modern medicine and the pharmaceutical industry. By making a pharmaceutical product into art, Hirst blurs the boundaries between art and science in this print, demanding that we appreciate the art behind science.