Are Lice Art?

Are lice art? A group of young artists from Berlin think so - and they're willing to go the distance to prove it: by living in an Israeli museum for three weeks with lice in their hair!

"The idea is that we live in the museum as their guests, and at the same time we are hosting lice on our heads," said artist Vincent Grunwald, 23, wearing a plastic shower cap to prevent the lice from spreading. [...]

"Art is no longer just a painting on the wall," Milana Gitzin-Adiram, chief curator of the Museum of Bat Yam near Tel Aviv, told Reuters. "Art is life, life is art."

The exhibition has caused controversy -- unintended, the artists say -- in a country where the mention of lice may revive memories of Nazi propaganda that described Jews as "parasites."

The artists, who sleep, eat and bathe in the gallery, said the exhibition toyed with ideas about hosts and guests in line with a theme set by the museum and aimed to blur the boundaries between art and reality.

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Yuck! Just having lice in your hair is not art to me. There is not beauty, message, etc that would make it art. It's just lice. More of an experiment that artistry I think.
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I'm a fine arts major and nowadays, the concept of what is art is stretched more and more to the point where I have to scratch my head and wonder, is that really art?

"art is life, life is art," how I wonder...
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Is it art? It all depends on the categorisations system you use. I can see how some can legitimately claim lice in ones hair as art.

fsmarch
I reckon if you had a pair of Salvidor Dali's undies with a skid mark, you'd promote them as valuable art, I would.
PS: It's a nice idea BTW. LOL
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Arty, if you have to scratch your head, maybe you've got some lice in there - time for an art show!

You wouldn't promote Salvador Dali's underwear as art - it's more in the memorabilia category. I'm sure if Dali could find someone stupid enough to buy it, he would have sold it. I wonder if Dali even wore underwear...? I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't.
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@ matt: Seconded
@ arty: I was a fine arts major too, and there were always people pushing the envelope of what was called art, but no one ever tried something this dumb. I'm sorry but, having living lice on your head is not art. I had a hard enough time accepting "Jack the Dripper" Jackson Pollock as an artist when I was in school.
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So everytime they checked us for lice in elementary school...they were quashing a potential creative outlet?

Ew.

At fsmarch: I'm pretty sure they have.
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Yeah the definition of art has broadened in more recent years and it's all good and dandy unless it hurts or causes distress to unwillingly participants, such as the guy who let a dog die from starvation in an art gallery. Ad it's all good because art is all about communication and if human communication develops along with us as human beings then it's just natural that art does too.

Oh man.
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