The terrifying 2010 piece of art that simulates death
Death is all around us, yet we never want to look too close at it.
On the one hand, this is understandable. Reminders of our own mortality are intensely uncomfortable; nobody needs to worry about being nothing more than ghosts piloting mechs of meat and bone, and one day, the two will separate. Neither do we like being reminded of all the times that death has forced us apart from the people we love and respect, yet at the same time, we’ll all have to confront it at some point, and art is one of the safest ways to do just that.
There are countless works of art confronting the great unknown. Films, books, music, you name it, not only are there many examples of work trying to make sense of the concept, but they also make up some of the greatest examples of those artworks as well. Then you get something like My Beautiful Chair. A work which, despite a title that’s innocuous to the point of comedy, gets a little too close for comfort for many people.
My Beautiful Chair is a work of art about the concept of euthanasia. The process of willingly ending one’s own life to eliminate pain and suffering. A concept so controversial that, despite surely being an extension of having control over one’s life and death, it remains a very illegal practise in most countries in the world, including the UK and most states in America. However, that’s not the only reason the piece is controversial.
No, most people have an understandable issue with the fact that My Beautiful Chair simulates euthanasia.
The work, designed by Australian artist Greg Taylor, is an installation that looks very humble on the surface. It’s a comfy brown leather armchair sat behind a small coffee table, on which a laptop and what looks like a briefcase sit. All of which are placed on a disconcertingly home-like carpet next to a lamp. The viewer then sits in the chair and discovers what the laptop and briefcase are. Together, they’re called The Deliverance Machine.
A foreboding term for something that can’t help but be morbid, despite being created with the best intentions in mind. The Deliverance Machine was created by an Australian doctor and pro-euthanasia activist Philip Nitschke to help people in need achieve a peaceful and painless death. The technology had been used by real people when euthanasia had been briefly legalised in the Northern Territory of Australia in the 1990s. Four people suffering from terminal cancer had gone through the procedure before a countrywide ban was put in place in 1997.
The piece quite literally puts you in those people’s shoes. After sitting in the chair, the viewer presses a button on the briefcase, and the laptop describes in real time what would happen to your body if you went through the process in real time. The very last moment of the piece is the laptop informing the viewer that “you are now dead”.
It was exhibited at the home for counter-cultural Australian art, the Museum for Old and New Art, in 2011 and was part of a broader, pro-euthanasia movement throughout the country, which ended up working.
Today, euthanasia is legal across Australia. One hopes that other countries in the world can catch up to them, and the likes of Canada, Spain and the Netherlands, and let people take control of their own death when they need it most.