The Empress (H10-3 Theodora). 2022.
Print: laminated giclée print on aluminum composite, screen print with glitter.
Signed on the reverse. From an edition of 3315 copies. 100 x 100 cm (39.3 x 39.3 in).


• Related to the work he made his breakthrough with in 1991, “In and Out of Love.” He bred butterflies in a humid tropical room, which then flew around the exhibition space and interacted with visitors.
• Most important representative of the Young British Artists. Winner of the 1995 Turner Prize. In 2012 Tate Modern, London mounted a retrospective of his work.
• Represented in the most important public collections worldwide including: MoMA, New York; Tate Gallery, London; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Fondazione Prada, Milan; Rubell Family Foundation, Miami; Hamburger Bahnhof—Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin; Sammlung Goetz, Munich; and Museum Brandhorst, Munich, among others.

A recurring motif in his work is butterflies, whose iconography is often interpreted as emissaries for the overcoming death or as symbols of immortality in relation to their metamorphosis. The print on offer here is part of the series "H10-2 The Empresses", which comprises five giclée prints. Each print is titled after an empress from a different historical period. Here, the butterflies are laid out like a kaleidoscope that changes with every movement. Just as our view of history and the conditions of whose stories are told and remembered are always changing.