Wim Delvoye is a Belgian artist who specialises in creating art that shocks and repulses and this contraption from the year 2000 is no exception.It’s known as Cloaca and is also his most famous work.
It’s basically a machine that replicates the human digestive system, or in layman’s terms a machine that turns food into shit. Quite why anyone would want to invent this is beyond me, although I guess it can be argued that it’s kind of interesting seeing the different chemical processes that occur in your body as food travels through it, but it’s probably only going to be interesting if you’re a biology/chemistry geek. Or if you love the idea of seeing shit created in the flesh.
It took Wim eight years to create it following extensive consultation with several different kinds of professionals, from plumbers to chemists to gastroenterologists. When asked why he had decided to create Cloaca, Delvoye replied that all of modern life is pointless, and so he thought the most pointless thing he could do with his life was spend 8 years making a machine that had no function except for turning food into waste. He sounds like a really interesting guy.
You could check out Cloaca at the Museum Of Contemporary Art in Antwerp in Belgium, although there are only live demonstrations twice a day because it takes so long for the machine to turn food into shit. Food is dropped through a meat grinder (simulating the teeth) and then passes through a series of flasks containing human digestive juices and enzymes.
At the end of the process, visitors to the museum are given the option to buy one of the pieces of shit in a vacuum packed translucent box. I’m sure this is a popular option, although it’s been commented that the turds stink so badly that most visitors to the museum can barely stand to be anywhere near it. Sounds like a real incentive to go and check this baby out live. Unfortunately, the exhibit closed until 2007 so you can’t actually do that anymore. I’m sure you’re all completely gutted about that, although apparently it may have moved to MONA in Tasmania, so if you’re in the southern hemisphere I guess it’s your lucky day.
Check out some pictures of it below and on the next page, as well as a couple of videos (including one from Eurotrash!!) of it in action:
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