Arts, Briefly; Shark Tale

By MARION UNDERHILL; COMPILED BY LAWRENCE VAN GELDER

Published: December 24, 2004

Charles Saatchi, one of Britain's foremost collectors of contemporary art, has been offered $11.55 million for Damien Hirst's 14-foot tiger shark floating in a tank of formaldehyde. Mr. Saatchi, the owner of the Saatchi Gallery in London, which is dedicated to promoting young British artists like Tracey Emin, bought the work 14 years ago for $92,000. A spokesman for Mr. Saatchi said the deal was likely to be clinched in the next few weeks. The spokesman confirmed that the offer had come from a client of the American art dealer Larry Gagosian, Mr. Hirst's New York agent. The sculpture, ''The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living'' (1991), above, was commissioned by Mr. Saatchi. Mr. Hirst used a shark bought in Australia for $11,000. In 2003, Mr. Saatchi sold 12 early works back to Mr. Hirst for a reported $14.45 million, and recently he sold another Hirst work, a sheep in formaldehyde titled ''Away From the Flock,'' for $2.8 million. MARION UNDERHILL