Totally International

Damien Hirst: It went on for three hours, this conversation.

Matthew Barney: Yes, which also felt right to me.

Hirst: Immortality is really desirable, I guess.

Barney: I think it's completely different depending on where it's seen and by whom.

Hirst: There’s no possible way you can get what you want.

Barney: What ends up happening is that as the vehicle moves through different bridges and tunnels into Manhattan, the drawing erases itself and has to start over again.

Hirst: Which I think is what you do anyway as a person, which is why people fall out, split up, get together, get into new bands or new ideas.

Barney: There are several questions in there.

Hirst: I don't really have a beginning.

Barney: The book really lends itself to that, and the notion of the gatefold.

Hirst: A window works like a mirror.

Barney: It probably started as a literal extension of Auto shaft and how five locations could be assigned to the mouthpiece, the bass and tenor drones.

Hirst: It’s like a graveyard, if you want to get metaphorical about it. It makes everything not make sense, there’s this unknown factor.

Barney: If the building could sing, what would it sound like?

Hirst: Totally international.