Diamonds are Forever
So it's cliche', and not the greatest Bond movie ever, but this is one phrase that happens to be fairly accurate. A diamond, as most people know, is the hardest material currently known. Thanks to its molecular lattice structure and being formed from graphite a diamond is said to be metastable, as well as kinetically stable, existing in its exceptional state for an appreciable amount of time. As far as Earth years go, the life of a kinetically stable object might as well be forever.
This stability of this gem is one reason it has become a symbol for eternal value. Even as their prices have dropped, the diamond is still synonymous with brilliance and $$$. Many of you have probably seen Damien Hirst's recent creation "For the Love of God," a life-size cast of a human skull in platinum and covered by 8,601 pave-set diamonds weighing 1,106.18 carats. There is a lot of discussion on the piece (e.g. here , here , here ). Personally, I like it. As a decadent death mask reflecting eternity, it would be hard to find a more appropriate material than diamonds. And, as a high production price artist obsessed with death, this might be Hirst's peak. However, what this piece has really done for me is caused me to notice and remember other uses of diamonds in unusual, artistic applications and why the gem is valuable (or not) in these applications.
Only a day after seeing Hirst's blingin' skull, i saw the Bruster's Diamond Treat. At first, I thought the piece was edible and those sparkles were just huge sugar crystals making a cone that would compete in a desert market that also contains multi-million dollar cakes . Brusters commissioned this gold and diamond replica of their signature treat to "represent Bruster's product quality and excellence of service." OK, I get it, but I think it's pretty ugly.
Perhaps the most famous use of diamonds in the fine art world is from Andy Warhol's Diamond Dust Shoe paintings . The diamond dust Warhol sprinkled on these paintings served to further glamorize his famous shoe motif, the symbol of the highs and lows of pop-art and high society. Warhol used the diamond effectively and emphasized what it is, a universal symbol for magic and money, with better recognition than any other object.
While Hirst and his agent purchased the diamonds for his skull, Vik Muniz probably borrowed the pile of gems he used to make his 2004 set "Pictures of Diamonds." Like usual, Muniz uses the materials to create portraits that will reflect that particular subject. In this case, the diamonds shine like stars in the likeness of an immortalized screen figure. In the end, all of these images and ideas are fleeting, but the gem will easily outlast, defying the ownership and social status placed upon it.
High production price art is a booming concept and "Diamond Damien" has made the figures jump immensely. However, there is an undeniable power in the stone's connotations of magic, wealth and stability. Most artists cannot afford to use the stone in their work, but for those that can, the diamond makes a definite statement, but it doesn't necessarily mean that the art will last forever.
Bette Davis - from Vik Muniz's Pictures of Diamonds series, 2004
Another diamond tidbit: As well as being the hardest known material, it is also the least compressible, and the stiffest material, the best thermal conductor with an extremely low thermal expansion, chemically inert to most acids and alkalis, transparent from the deep uv through the visible to the far infrared, and is one of the few materials known with a negative electron affinity (or work function).