There is a new twist in the corpse as art material thread of contemporary art history. Russian artist Andrei Molodkin, whose work will appear in this year’s Venice Biennale, and whose current exhibition at Daneyal Mahmood Gallery (through April 11), has developed a technique to transform corpses into crude oil that can be turned into gas or be molded into a sculpture. The apparatus that performs the transformation takes two to three months to change the human body to oil. The waiting list for the procedure includes a BBC reporter who wants his oily remains to be turned into a sculpture of a brain and a French porn actress who wants to be turned into a sculpture of praying hands. No announcements from any of the major art supply companies indicating that they are planning joint ventures with funeral home businesses have turned up yet.
primary source: The Independent
3.17.2009