Saturday

Deadly Arts

Filed under Art News, Controversial Art, Thoughts

An ominously dense deluge of debate hangs heavy in the atmosphere of the art community. Gregor Schneider, a German artist, decided that his next piece of art will be similar to the execution of a criminal. The only difference is that there will be no execution and there will be no criminal, just death and just art.

Currently, he’s seeking already-dying volunteers to lay in an art gallery, alone, in view of uneasily curious onlookers who anticipate nothing more than for the subject to take his or her last breath, so Schneider can simply capture what he calls, “the beauty in death.”

Controversy arises when critics and art lovers mutually suggest that the German artist is doing nothing more then making a mockery of death. “He’s just turning it into a carnival act,” says an online blogger in agreement with numerous opinions spanning the globe. A more open-minded blogger, on the other hand, suggested that, “Now that the world has abortion and death as art, it’s funny how [artists] never seem to bring life into the world as art [anymore].” All of the taboo surrounding Schneider may be unwarranted when other artists, Schneider’s predecessors, did things so taboo as to remove their own ears. Continue…