Does anyone remember the Danish artist Marco Evaristti. No? I am not surprised. But if I ask you if you remember the artist who put goldfish in blenders a few years back I am sure most of you know who I am talking about. A quick recap for those of you who don’t remember the story. Marco Evaristti displayed an exhibition at the art museum in Trapholt, Kolding in Denmark. In the exhibition he placed goldfish in household blenders and invited the viewers to turn on the blenders and kill the fish if they wanted to. This was in the year 2000, now he wants to display a new exhibit where he feeds the dead body of an executed prisoner to goldfish.
The convict in question is Gene Harthorn who is awaiting the death penalty for murder in Texas. He has given the artist consent to use his body as fish food in the name of art.
Marco Evaristti, who doesn’t see anything ethically wrong with his project want to freeze the body of the convict and make fish food out of it. He has found a German company that is willing to freeze the body. He wants to have an exhibition featuring a large tank with hundreds of goldfish and allow the visitors to feed the dead body to them.
The purpose of the art is to inspire discussion about the death penalty. He wants to create opinion surrounding the fact that people are killed legally in our western civilization.
He has yet to find a venue to display his art in.