In perhaps the greatestart-marketing campaign inhistory, Sotheby’s andDamien Hirst pulled off anextraordinary feat on theevening of September 15and the following afternoon,selling £111.5 million ($200million) worth of the artist’sfreshly minted work in lessthan 24 hours against a backdropof global financial ruin.To put this monster tallyin perspective, consider theNovember 1997 sale atChristie’s of the Victor andSally Ganz trove of modernmasterpieces, assembledover nearly 50 years andfabled for its significant holdingsof Picassos, Johnses,Rauschenbergs and Stellas,which fetched $207 million.

The Hirst pieces,offered in a sale titledBeautiful Inside My HeadForever, are the resultof more than two years ofplanning and careful executionby Hirst and his 160-man production company,Science. The evening, whichnetted the artist as muchas $100 million for hishigh-stakes gamble, wasremarkable in other ways aswell. All but five of the 223lots sold, for an average priceof £511,306 ($920,881),with 48 fetching in excess of$1 million and 5 bringingmore than $5 million. Of thehandful of rejects, thedouble shark tank Theology,Philosophy, Medicine, Justiceand the star-shaped, fly-encrustedDevil Worshiper,both made in 2008, wereacquired after the auction bya seasoned Swiss dealer whocouldn’t believe his luck.

“[The sale] representsa complete and utterparadigm shift for the artmarket,” says Tania BuckrellPos, head of the Londonarts consultancy Arts &Management International.“The artist is circumventingthe dealer process and goingdirectly to [his] audience.”Pos didn’t bid during the£70.5 million ($126.5 million)evening session, because herclients decided against it.

Like Pos, the Londondealer Helly Nahmad,although an early supporterof Hirst, refrained frombidding at the evening sale.“I prefer to be in somethingthat has a lot less risk,” hesays. Nahmad feels the entiresale was indicative of theart-market “moving closer toa business model.” He characterizesHirst as being“between a superstar artistand a luxury brand” andterms investing in his latestoeuvre as “much easier thanbuying a modern picture—all you need to know aretwo or three facts: It’s Hirst,it’s Sotheby’s, it’s luxury. . . .You could have a Hirstcompany as large as LVMH .”

Indeed, Hirst demonstratedhis überconfidence—and skill—as a brand makerthe night of the eveningsale. Instead of attending,he listened to the proceedingsvia a speakerphonewhile playing snookerwith the world-champion,Ronnie Sullivan, in downmarketCamden, as ifthe high-stakes auctionwere just another YBA lark.

A number of seasonedplayers have been trying tomake sense of the sale’smassive numbers and determineits import for themarket. Some pundits haveeven alleged that Hirst’spowerhouse dealers—JayJopling, of White Cube, andLarry Gagosiancookedthe results with secret assurancesto Sotheby’s made inreturn for special terms tobuy the vast array ofbrand-new property. Like allconspiracy theories, thiscontains a grain of truth:Jopling openly bid on 20 ofthe 56 lots offered and isknown to have acquired five,including the gory triplecabinet of anatomical partsThe Triumvirate (est. £1.5–2 million; $2.7–3.6 million),for £1,721,250 ($3.1 million),while Gagosian’s StefanRatibor bought at least one.However, those actionsare less collusion than businessas usual.

What is curious is thatSotheby’s has declined torelease its usual geographicbreakdown of buyers. Whythe secrecy? Was marketmanipulation at workhere? Or was it more a caseof Sotheby’s being bashfulabout the paucity ofAmerican buyers and theabundance of new-wealthtaste from other parts?

There was significantbidding by the Russians.One of the telephone clientservices’ specialists, AlinaDavey, who speaks fluentRussian, bagged at least fivelots. The Ukrainian billionaireVictor Pinchuk has said hebought works for his museumin Kiev. The one statisticSotheby’s did release wastelling: 35 percent of thebidders in the eveningsession were new to thecontemporary department.

“I know the newmarkets were fairly active,”says Mark Poltimore, chairmanof Sotheby’s Russia. “Ifyou’ve got $2 billion [as manybidders do] $2 million spenthere is just a bit of interestfor a week.”

Will the Hirst triumphinduce other superstarartists to circumvent theirdealers? “I’ve been askedby the auction housesto put work up directly,”says Richard Prince, “[but]it’s never been somethingI’ve been interested in.I’d rather keep what I makefor myself.

"That Mammon Moment" originally appeared in the November 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's November 2008 Table of Contents.