The Daily Swarm

Art World (via Wagner and Partner Gallery”):

Australian-born Natascha Stellmach claims to have acquired the ashes of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain. Now she’s transformed the grunge star’s remains into an installation titled Set Me Free, that investigates suicide and the power of desecration.

With this work, Stellmach joins a number of artists to use human remains as a medium; Danish artist Marco Evarissti plans to feed death row inmate Gene Hathorn to goldfish upon his execution.

Stellmach’s work comprises a “death cycle” of five pieces. The first, a suicide contemplation, titled It is Black in Here, is a sound piece. Written and read by the artist, it was recorded onto a specifically pressed record and is played on a vintage record player.

The six-minute poetic meditation on death’s proximity ends with the word ‘Gone’. Near Death Experience, is a text-based work where Kurt Cobain, Adolf Hitler, Diane Arbus and the Brothers Grimm meet in a twilight zone. Two more works, Black Scan and Untitled, build to the final work: Gone. In Gone, Stellmach presents a joint containing Cobain’s ashes, which is held in an antique case engraved with the work’s title. Stellmach intends to smoke this joint in a secret Berlin location. This act, according to the artist, will release Cobain “into the ether from the media circus.”

Asked how she came to have Cobain’s ashes, let alone smoke them, Stellmach told Artworld:“That’s confidential and kind of magic. They came to me.”

EARLIER:

Report: Kurt Cobain ashes stolen from Courtney Love’s house…kept in a pink teddy-bear-shaped bag…