| Arvon |
07-20-2002 10:33 PM |
• We keep trying to plumb the depths of idiocy that characterize the world of avant-garde art, but we are coming to think that those depths may, perhaps, be un-plumbable, Consider the brief career of Italian artist Piero Manzoni, who died at the age of 29 from a liver condition brought on by hard drinking, Prior to his death, Manzoni decided to make-guess what?- "an ironic statement" about the art markets. He thereupon canned 90 samples of his own feces, labeled the cans appropriately ("mereda d'artista"), and offered them for sale. If you think that no sane person would shell out good money for canned poop, you are simply not au coutant. London's Tate Gallery recently acquired a can for £22,300. Since this is more than the item would fetch if its 30 grams of ordure were replaced by an equal weight of pure gold, this is very good money indeed. The Pompidou Museum of Paris and the Museum of Modern Art in New York have also bought cans of the late Signot Manzoni's doo-doo, we learn. Gallery-goers should maintain a prudent distance from the exhibit, though: Owing to defects in the canning process, 45 of the original 90 cans have exploded.
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