the Sam Jackson College Experience

UPDATE: Was performance art in and of itself.

New Haven, Conn. — April 17, 2008

Ms. Shvarts is engaged in performance art. Her art project includes visual representations, a press release and other narrative materials. She stated to three senior Yale University officials today, including two deans, that she did not impregnate herself and that she did not induce any miscarriages. The entire project is an art piece, a creative fiction designed to draw attention to the ambiguity surrounding form and function of a woman’s body.

She is an artist and has the right to express herself through performance art.

Had these acts been real, they would have violated basic ethical standards and raised serious mental and physical health concerns.

So there you have it: the University offered a quick explanation after initiating an investigation. Original post follows.

I will be watching to see how Yale deals with what will certainly explode (is exploding) into a huge controversy: as reported by the Yale Daily News, a senior art project is soon to be presented in which a student continually inseminated herself and then forced miscarriages, preserving the blood and filming the process.

Beginning next Tuesday, Aliza Shvarts ‘08 will be displaying her senior art project, a documentation of a nine-month process during which she artificially inseminated herself “as often as possible” while periodically taking abortifacient drugs to induce miscarriages. Her exhibition will feature video recordings of these forced miscarriages as well as preserved collections of the blood from the process.

The goal in creating the art exhibition, Shvarts said, was to spark conversation and debate on the relationship between art and the human body. But her project has already provoked more than just debate, inciting, for instance, outcry at a forum for fellow senior art majors held last week. And when told about Shvarts’ project, students on both ends of the abortion debate have expressed shock — saying the project does everything from violate moral code to trivialize abortion.

No, not a joke. {Update, 10 hours after the fact: Yes, actually a hoax! Thankfully.}

I tuned into a webinar about crisis management over the summer hosted by Karine Joly’s Higher Ed Experts, and saw some interesting insight into how schools can manage crises.

Too bad that Michael Dame, director of Web and Communications at Virginia Tech, won’t be giving his webinar about online crisis management for a few weeks. Yale could use some advice right about now, I think. This story has already hit Drudge report, and the YDN has been having some trouble with the traffic.

Oh, also? Yale is just about to host a big climate change conference with governors from the US, premiers from Canada, nobel laureates, etc.

Let’s watch the ensuing negative PR explosion… more on this as things develop.

If you want to check the temperature of the blogosphere or interwebs at large, you can see just a really, really furious reaction bubbling up. Antisemitic pro-choicers seem to be some of the nastiest commentators.

Because the YDN site is having problems with traffic, the full article is available after the break. For a sample of her other artwork, check a piece in Dimensions magazine (Yale publication) from January.

UPDATE: In addition to Drudge, it is now on the front page of Fox News, under “Outrage Over ‘Self-Abortion Art’” — fantastic. Lots of quotes from the National Right to Life Committee people.
UPDATE2: In addition, I should add that it’s also been on Jezebel (more than once), Gawker, Perez Hilton, … and many more. That’s a lot of eyeballs.
UPDATE3: I would additionally note that it is still worth considering the plausibility of this account, effectiveness rates for the herbs in question, and general health risks rendering it more or less likely that it was possible to undertake this. However, the YDN is not one to make up stories like this, so I am going to wait and see how it plays out more before calling “hoax” on it.

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