Quinn creates golden Moss for British Museum sculpture show

Following the sale of Damien Hirst's diamond-encrusted skull for £50m, fellow White Cube artist Marc Quinn has produced his own "bling-bling" work of art - a solid gold sculpture of Kate Moss. The piece, called Siren, is part of the same series as Sphinx, the white-painted bronze sculpture of the supermodel contorted into an extreme yoga position that the artist first unveiled in 2006 (pictured).

The gold version, which has cost £1.5m to produce, will form the centrepiece of the British Museum's first exhibition of contemporary sculpture in more than a decade, and will be auctioned for charity when the show closes. Quinn says of Moss: "She is a contemporary version of the Sphinx. A mystery. There must be something about her that has clicked with the collective unconscious to make her so ubiquitous, so spirit of the age."

The as-yet-untitled exhibition, which is still at its planning stages, will include works by a series of artists inspired by the British Museum's own collection of sculpture.