There was little sign of a credit crunch at the Damien Hirst spectacular. Sotheby's experienced a bull run — quite literally, when it came to the sale's star lot The Golden Calf, which went under the hammer for a record-breaking £10.3 million. If you can't save money in the bank, then preserve it in formaldehyde, seemed to be the message.

This sale was highly significant. Twenty years ago the commercially minded maverick Hirst staged the landmark show Freeze, bypassing dealers and their smart West End galleries, and so plonked a gang of anarchic students in the middle of Britain's cultural map.

Now Hirst has bucked the trend again and, in a high-risk venture, cut out the middle man to sell directly to the public. Dealers were watching with painfully divided loyalties.

They were keen to see the success that would prove that the contemporary bubble was not broken - and the price of their stock had not fallen (as it did back in the 1990s) by about 50 per cent overnight. But they were terrified of the precedent that this sale could set as more artists set out to maximise profits by excising the gallery's 50 per cent cut from their financial equation.

Hirst's gamble has paid off for him - not least since it is rumoured that he persuaded Sotheby's auction house to waive their customary seller's premium. But what about the buyers? Is it wise to back a butterfly painting instead of a bank?

The art world is notoriously secretive. The sale room may have been crammed, its auctioneer offering a finely choreographed performance to a packed house of buyers, gawpers, gallerists and celebrity-spotters. But there was a special VIP room for those too opulent to wave paddles in public. There were banks of telephone operators taking mysterious long-distance bids.

There were intricate webs of rumours and lots of jealous surmise. Were Jay Jopling and Larry Gagosian (Hirst's usual dealers) propping up prices to ensure the continuing value of their already extensive (and, some say, hard to shift) stocks?

Had Sotheby's offered them incentives to steer buyers towards the sale? Had the auction house had to call in every outstanding favour? Is the Hirst market about to suffer severe flood damage? How long does it take for a zebra to rot?

Hirst can take his money and run. This sale could almost be seen as his most successful artwork.

Was it a carefully orchestrated scam? The next few months will show us. If it all crashes, there will be one consolation: pickled animals and polka dots are more interesting to look at than Lehman share certificates.

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