Cloaca Poop

When a DC Art News reader sent me a link that then led to this site, at first I though that it was a joke.

It isn't.

Belgian artist Wim Delvoye has created a machine that reproduces the series of organic events that takes place in the human digestive system when a person eats, starting from swallowing the food via the mouth to discarding the fecal matter through your rear orifice.

Delvoye calls his machine the Cloaca.

He feeds the Cloaca ordinary food and eventually shit comes out from the other end. This Cloaca shit is then wrapped in plastic and sold to "art collectors."

And according to the Cloaca website, the shit is sold out! And the "remaining 100 feces have been held back for future capitalisation [sic]."

See the machine(s) here. Note that a couple of the shitmakingmachine logos are certainly within striking range of a lawsuit from Coke or Mr. Clean.

Update: Last year Charles Downey in Ionarts had this terrific piece on Delvoye and the machine and other projects, including the translation of an informative interview with the artist.