Damien Hirst. Picture credi: Tate/PA Wire.

North Devon’s controversial resident celebrity artist discusses his ideas of a seven by 40 feet giant bronze poo sculpture.

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DAMIEN Hirst could set tongues wagging again after talking about a potential project in the pipeline in the shape of a giant ‘human poo’ in bronze.

The controversial artist and creator of Ilfracombe’s Verity statue, mentioned the bizarre idea in an interview on the BBC Radio 4 Front Row show on February 22.

Presenter John Wilson and the celebrity artist, who lives near Combe Martin, were discussing art and humour after the release of 50 limited edition prints of his famous £50million diamond skull – with a red nose on it to raise money for Comic Relief.

Then Mr Hirst went on to tell the chuckling presenter of his long standing idea to create a giant human faeces, seven feet high and 40 feet long.

“I was going to make it the most perfect poo you could make in bronze,” he said.

“So one minute if you did it in the toilet you would want to go and tell your friends about it, it’s like so healthy and perfect, and then put it outside somewhere, and I was going to call it ‘Untitled’ and in brackets ‘(Number 2)’.”

To much laughter he said he had actually made a model, but never the full creation, but explained his thinking behind the idea: “… it forces people to look at things, you know, they might be not that keen on looking at, but then it’s healthy, it means you’re well, so, you know, it’s a beautiful object.”

When Mr Wilson said “So we might still see this then?” Hirst replied “Yeah, I think so. I mean I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

The artist’s 2007 diamond skull entitled For the Love of God is a real human skull and encrusted with almost 9,000 diamonds. His £2,500 ‘Red Nose’ prints are called For the Love of Comic Relief and have already sold out, with all proceeds going to charity.

Comic Relief takes place on Friday of next week (March 15).

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