Yale College Statement and Rebuttal
Several hours after the initial story broke and a firestorm of press coverage brought down the Yale Daily News website, Yale College issued a press release affirming that the miscarriages and exhibit were performance art. In the press release, the university spokesperson revealed that rather than the alleged cube of miscarried remains, the performance had consisted in the invention of the story of their creation. "Ms. Shvarts is engaged in performance art," it read. "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." Shvarts, in a guest article for the Yale Daily News maintained that she had conducted artificial inseminations as well as self-induced miscarriage procedures (although she was unaware of whether she was pregnant).
For the past year, I performed repeated self-induced miscarriages … Using a needleless syringe, I would inject the sperm near my cervix within 30 minutes of its collection, so as to insure the possibility of fertilization. On the 28th day of my cycle, I would ingest an abortifacient, after which I would experience cramps and heavy bleeding. ... Because the miscarriages coincide with the expected date of menstruation (the 28th day of my cycle), it remains ambiguous whether the there was ever a fertilized ovum or not. The reality of the pregnancy, both for myself and for the audience, is a matter of reading.
—Aliza Shvarts, Yale Daily News, April 18, 2008
Robert Storr, dean of Yale's art school, threatened to ban Shvarts from displaying her project unless she wrote a confession attesting that the project was a fiction and that no human blood would be used.
Read more about this topic: Yale Student Abortion Art Controversy
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