Recently, Yale University art student Aliza Shvarts duped the student newspaper with a story about inducing repeated abortions on herself and using the blood for her senior art project.
Shvarts told the student paper that she planned to display a work that consisted of a cube lined with plastic sheets with a blood and petroleum jelly mixture in between, onto which she would project video footage of herself experiencing miscarriages in her bathroom tub. The footage was allegedly obtained over a nine-month period during which she artificially inseminated herself “as often as possible” while taking abortifacient drugs to induce miscarriages.
Of course, the story about Shvarts’ project spread like wildfire across blogs and major media outlets. Most everyone was offended. Even the Pro-Life and Pro-Choice people put down their opposing banners long enough to be equally pissed off.
Then, there was Aunt B. who wasn’t duped by the hoax at all.
In fact, she said:
And I just want to say, before you stroke out at the thought of what she claims she’s done, take a second to think about whether she could have done what she claims she’s done. In my opinion, and I could be wrong, this is an important portion of her art–how people react to what she claims she’d done.
Turns out, B. was right.
According to Yale spokeswoman Helaine Klasky, the entire project was creative fiction. (Read here.)
As a result of this “fiction,” I’d imagine the editor for the student newspaper is justifiably angry and somewhat embarrassed. School officials were likely enraged once the story hit the media. Shvarts, who was finally confronted by those officials and has probably received a record-breaking amount of hate mail and death threats within the last 24 hours, has disconnected her phone and isn’t communicating with the press. And people are still seething over he concept — and the fact that they were misled only adds to their anger.
Yes, the art Shvarts claimed was brutal and offensive.
However, I’ve got to say if a large component of the art was the reaction – then, the project has been pretty damned revealing.
If you isolate the reaction, it displays our ability to unite, in spite of our divisive nature, against what is unquestionably and morally abhorrent. It exposes our voracious appetite for scandalous media and real-life horror stories. Clearly, we crave monsters both real and imagined.
It suggests that media is motivated by the public’s desires: and that we’re all too willing to digest any information as truth and render judgment (often in absence of the facts.) I also noticed that when the inaccuracies came to light, we assigned blame: whether it be to the student who started her own rumor or the media who unwittingly spread it around: but at the same time, most did not alter their initial opinions. We were angry over the act: we are equally angry over the imagination.
I also found it interesting that not a single person (at least none I read) posed the question: “Well, who were the assholes that donated the sperm? Did they know about the project?”
Don’t get me wrong – had this tale been true: yes, the “art” would serve as an indicator that the student was irresponsible and unbalanced. But if we’re going to demonize a woman for regularly forcing her body to slough off the uterine lining (because whether or not she was pregnant would be medically debatable) shouldn’t the man who attempted to fertilize the egg be called into question as well? Do women bear complete and total responsibility for new life by virtue of location? So, responsibility is determined by that whole possession is 9/10th of the law thing? Then, technically, women are liable for anything and everything beyond conception – which somehow doesn’t seem fair.
With all that having been said, while I understand that art and sociology are irrevocable intertwined and do dig the concept of eliminating the individual artist and creating a situation wherein society is the art: I don’t see Shvarts’ point here.
Does she have a thesis statement? What did she intend to prove? What was the predicted response? According to the AP release, her intent was to spark conversation and debate on the relationship between art and the human body — and this didn’t happen. We are debating morality, education, abortion — but not art.
So, where’s the rest of the project? Is this it? If so, then the artist fell short in the area of presentation.
Incomplete/F
The artists intent in this project is to draw attention to herself for being controversial.
This is how some artists get street cred. It’s becoming harder to do as we’ve seen the following:
* Black and white photos of crucifixes in urine jars and gay anal fisting
* Pigs sawn into two
* Dessicated humans embalmed in clear acrylic
* Cutting off your limbs and having a car smash into your chest while filming your own death
* And now… filming your multiple abortions.
If you, the art public, doesn’t immediately rave over all this “art”, then it is implied that you are not sophisticated enough to understand and the subtleties and layers of meaning to be found in fancy high brow art work.
Jeffrey Dahlmer was an artiste, don’t you know! And Charles Manson as well. Perhaps Yale will give Charles Manson a Honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts for his life’s body of artistic accomplishment.
Still the ongoing reaction to her “fiction” is interesting.
So, if this were study of social anthropology or some related field, I’d consider it brilliant and then be pissed off because I was an unwitting research subject – but art?
Eh. I accept that most modern art is political… strives to be controversial. No, I don’t always appreciate it and this could be due to my lack of sophistication – but mostly I consider it lazy. Allowing controversy rather than the work itself to create the interestingness implies a lack of talent to me – but then again, I’m no art critic.
But this project is a flop for other reasons. As a stand-alone: it failed to make any point or statement.
And if the public reaction was intended to contribute to the performance: this wasn’t represented in any comprehensible way: therefore, I don’t see it. Literally.
Again: great study of culture/society. Shitty and somewhat misguided art project. So the lesson here is: oil or gouache are far better mediums than human behavior.
Yes I agree with you completely. I was being sarcastic when I said the public is not sophisticated enough to understand highbrow art, I think the public understands exactly what is going on there!
Your summary is a perfect insight into the work. As you said, her claimed meaning just doesn’t hold up. It is controversy for its own sake rather than anything with any substantial point or meaning.