touching the untouchables

Artist Santiago Sierra has a new exhibition at the Lisson Gallery in London, that is literally a pile of sh&t. But it's also a serious work:

21 ANTHROPOMETRIC MODULES MADE FROM HUMAN FAECES BY THE PEOPLE OF SULABH INTERNATIONAL, INDIA

The work is made of 21 modules of human faeces, each measuring 215 x 75 x 20cm. […] Workers of the sanitary movement Sulabh International of India are mostly scavengers who, by birth, have to undertake the physically and psychologically painful task of collecting human faecal matter, being charged with the blames of a previous life of bad deeds.

Yup, it's 21 monolithic blocks of sh&t. But the art forces the viewer to wonder how such an enormous pile of shi% could be assembled, and the physical reality of it in front of the eyes attunes their mind to the plight and working conditions of these laborers at the bottom of the bottom of India’s society, a depth which we simply cannot fathom from our everyday experience alone.

Like the Indian laborers in Dubai toiling on modern-day pyramids, the workers of Sulabh International are an exploited class whose working conditions are far worse than they need to be. Unlike the Dubai workers, they have much less recourse to assert themselves or bring attention to their plight, except perhaps via art such as this.