Guerilla artists froze what appeared to be dog poo inside 40-stone blocks of ice before leaving them outside some of London’s most prestigious galleries and auction houses for a stunt during an annual celebration of contemporary art.
Frieze Week was launched in the capital in 2003 and has since gone global, but in recent years it’s been accused of portraying the art world at its “most brazenly commercial, its most avaricious and capitalistic”.
The stunt last week by a group known as Konn Artiss was apparently aimed at “blurring the line between art, absurdity, and market critique”. The collective has previously made headlines with stunts in Venice and Washington. A statement near the work, outside Phillips Auction House in upmarket Berkley Square, read: “When the market freezes, art melts. It’s not a protest. It’s a reflection. We’re all stuck in the same ice.”
The guerilla artist added: “I froze a block of s*** because that’s what the market feels like right now. The frame on the wall is the context; the ice on the pavement is the reality. Make of it what you want.”
Earlier in the week, the group left frozen blocks containing miniature effigies of some of the art world’s most recognisable figures — including Damien Hirst, Andy Warhol, Tracey Emin and Jeff Koons — at London’s biggest art week.
