Squatters' Piss
Squatters' Piss takes a more belligerent approach to the exploration of perceptions and branded products. Urine from the inhabitants of the J. B. Spray squat in Nottingham is distilled to extract pure water, ironically packaged as an expensive product. As art objects, the bottles recall Artist’s Shit by Piero Manzoni, described by Stephen Bury in Artist’s Multiples 1935-2000 as, “a joke, a parody of the art market, and a critique of consumerism and the waste it generates." The distiller itself is a crude contraption, jarring with the white cube space as the smell of urine dispels myths of class or hierarchy and notions of elitism collapse as we are reminded of our base bodily functions.
Wine into Water
Seven of the Squatters' Piss bottles lined the font of All Hallow's church in Lady Bay for the Open Lady Bay Festival 2010. Although the anarchic undertones of Squatters' Piss sit awkwardly alongside the concept of organised religion, the curation was in sympathy with the piece's origins in spiritual questioning, wonderment at nature and anti-materialism.
