Scatological Art Exhibition 'La Chine' at L.a.v.a. in Paris

The exhibition 'La Chine' was held at L.a.v.a. (Les Arts visuels actuels) in Paris from December 12, 2003 to January 31, 2004. Curated by Togolese Dr. Zoabena Fahm, it featured three artists: Welsh Punkreach, Czech Filip Richar, and Chilean Miguel Cheri. The title is a pun on the French phrase 'Les fakirs arrivent toujours à pied par la Chine,' leading to a scatological theme. The invitation card showed the curator smoking on a toilet. Punkreach's painting 'Shitting on the Top of the World' depicts a figure on a toilet surrounded by magazine clippings of war and terrorism. His sculpture '∞' is an enamel toilet block with a newborn body and umbilical cord-like feces, referencing Marcel Duchamp's 'Fountain.' Miguel Cheri's large wall sculpture features a toilet expelling faces, bones, and serpentine intestines, reminiscent of Rodin's 'Gates of Hell.' A small pink ceramic piece with star-shaped orifices resembles anuses. Filip Richar contributed abstract assemblages evoking an outhouse. The exhibition treats scatology without being 'a shitty show.'