Picture: 'The Immoralist'

Nick Kushner, a 28-year-old from New York, has been creating detailed, occultish paintings with his own blood since he was 15, and says the pain he feels when drawing the ‘paint’ from his body is cathartic. Kushner uses blood to put himself in his work, but says that some people stop admiring his paintings when they find out how they’re made. “Whether people like it or not, they have a powerful reaction, which is the most important thing,” he says.

At a recent exhibition in Los Angeles, he exhibited dark images of an octopus strangling God, a spooky self-portrait and a wilting rose, dripping in, er… blood. 

VISIT: Thethirdangelsounded.com

Picture: 'Spermcube'

In 2004, French artist Philippe Meste decided to fill a transparent, 1000-litre cube with spunk, in an attempt to show that he could hypothetically impregnate millions of women. To reach his goal, Meste got school kids from Belgium to make the cube and then put a call out to men all over the world to help him fill it, so for a while, donor kits could be requested from the now defunct Spermcube.org.

Meste refrigerated the cube to just above zero degrees, but it was hard to maintain a constant temperature. He struggled to get donations, and his cube was never filled.

VISIT: Tinyurl.com/spermcube

Picture: 'Piss Christ'

In 1987, the New York-based conceptual artist Andres Serrano photographed a little plastic crucifix in a glass of his own wee-wee. ‘Piss Christ’ was intended to be a statement on “those who abuse the teachings of Christ for their own ignoble ends”, but he ended up receiving death threats, and in April, a print of it was slashed in Avignon by French Catholic fundamentalists.

In 2008, Serrano produced a show called Shit, comprising photos of dung – his own and animals’. “One thing I learned from the ‘Piss Christ’ controversy is that I was able to take the  heat, so I stayed in the kitchen,” he says. 

VISIT: Andresserrano.org

Picture: '21 Anthropometric Modules Of Human Faeces By The People Of Sulabh International, India'

Spain’s shock provocateur Santiago Sierra first exhibited his ‘21 Anthropometric Modules...’ in London in 2007. While these slabs don’t look like they’re made of poo, they are. Procured in New Delhi and Jaipur by a company that clears human waste from India’s streets, the shit lay dormant in India for three years before it was mixed with plastic, moulded into large tablets, and shipped to Britain for art-lovers to sniff at. 

VISIT: Santiago-sierra.com

Picture: 'Bogey Ball'

James Ford collected snot to create his ‘Bogey Ball’. The idea struck him in 2002 when he was halfway through the final year of his fine arts degree at Nottingham Trent University. “I was having a conversation with a friend who didn’t like contemporary art, and he said, ‘You might as well pick your nose and display that as art,’” Ford tells us. “The little flakes of mucus took a long time to start piling up, and I kept them in a Tom And Jerry egg cup. It took around two years for the ‘Bogey Ball’ to reach the same size as a Brussels sprout.”

Ford’s ‘Bogey Ball’ was exhibited at his degree show, a group exhibition in London, and in Vilnius, Lithuania. “Some people were disgusted,” he says, “I’ve [also] had some negative comments on online forums. One in particular said I should be shot, which I thought was a bit harsh.”

VISIT: Jamesrford.com

Picture: 'Menstruation Series'

American artist Jennifer Weigel makes prints by pressing her monthly, bloodied vagina on watercolour paper to encourage women “to find ways to celebrate their cycles through art”. “When I started making art about menstruation, I was using acrylic paint to convey blood,” she tells us. “That seemed insincere to me, so I began to use my own blood because of the symbolism and taboo associated with it. The use of menstrual blood in art is shocking, but I hope that by incorporating my blood into my art, I can help to demystify this natural function of the female body.”

Last year Weigel banded together 13 American female artists to create Life Blood Exhibit, a show about the monthly cycle, which will tour America next year.

VISIT: Jenniferweigelart.com and Lifebloodexhibit.com

Picture: A spooge special on orange litmus paper

Jordan McKenzie, a fine art lecturer at Camberwell College Of Art in London, has been spunking onto litmus paper since 2007. “I don’t want control over my work,” he says, “and when I masturbate the semen goes where it goes, creating weird, biological growths on the paper.”

McKenzie’s paintings sell for around £1,000 each and poke fun at the pomposity of conceptual art, but a few people are disgruntled by his work. “One local priest said I was a very disturbed young man,” he says. 

VISIT: Jordanmckenzie.co.uk

Picture: 'American Pride'

During a routine medical blood test in 2008, Australian tattoo artist and painter Dr Rev asked if he could take home an empty container used to store the red stuff, and hasn’t looked back since. After drawing blood, he pours it into a shot glass and applies it to canvas. “It makes me feel complete,” Dr Rev says. “It was never designed to be used as paint, and it doesn’t handle like paint, so it keeps me on my toes.”

Dr Rev, who says he only gets positive responses to his work, has had four exhibitions so far this year, and has another two booked before September. 

VISIT: Bloodpainting.com

Picture: a 60ml bottle of his poo perfume, Surplu

Since graduating in fine art last year, Jammie Nicholas has made his name with eau de colon. Inspired by French psychoanalyst Dominique Laporte’s book History Of Shit (1978), which states that ‘all smells are primordially the smell of shit,’ Nicholas decided to make a perfume extracted from his own faeces, named Surplus. He produced 85 bottles, which he exhibited and sold for £40 each.

“One lady was disgusted,” he says. “She liked the smell of the sample card, but threw it on the floor
when she found out what was in it.” 

VISIT: Jammienicholas.com