Sperm ( Installation / Performance )
Performance time: 21-23 May 2006
Venue: Kangda Hotel, Yan’an, China. “Long March Project-Yan’an,” “Yan’an Forum on Art Education” meeting room and lounge.
Project: The famous international art project “Long March Project-Yan’an” arrived in Yan’an in May of 2006. More than forty other artists along with several dozen experts and scholars arrived in Yan’an to undertake experimentation, creation, study, debate, and exhibition proposals.
Curator: Lu Jie
Material
1. A CM-M model temperature control machine. Temperature range:+/- 50° C (ratio of differentiation 0.1° C) Medical regulations: sperm must be kept at 4°
Centigrade, then gradually frozen to -20° and finaly -80°. Finally, they are stored at -196° in liquid nitrogen jars. This freezing process naturally eliminates
sperm of poor quality and kills all possible bacteria. In order to prevent AIDS, sperm must be stored for six months before use. 2. 12 empty bottles in which to place the sperm.
3. A rack on which to place the bottles.
Performance Method ( All male at meeting and visitor)
1) Participants - Male (sperm donors): no age limit; Female (sperm recipient): Xiao Lu, 44
2) Time period-First instance: May 21-23, 2006
3) Men willing to participate in the project take a bottle from the work “Sperm” located in the lounge of the Long March Yan’an Project’s Yan’an Forum on Art
Education in the Kangda Hotel, deposit sperm samples into the jars, and return them to the refrigerator.
4) The sperm recipient will undergo artificial insemination during her fertile period each month using the sperm thus collected.
The first attempt to collect in Yan’an failed.