As an American, I disavow any responsibility for this work, as France and the Marquis de Sade had us beat by centuries.

Just because something is art doesn't mean it isn't gross stupidity.

But I maintain that the alleged self-insemination/abortion act is not art, just gross stupidity.

But since you acknowledge that art is in the eye of the beholder, it isn't that it isn't art, it just isn't art to you. So it may very well legitimately be art to a lot of other people.

What's the difference between what the Yale student said she did and Ed Gehn who made lampshades out of human skin and dug up dead bodies to obtain said materials? Was he making an artistic statement with his lampshades?

I'm pretty sure those lampshades were art to Ed, at least. Not that I'm encouraging dead body art. But then, what's the difference between, say, a human-skin lampshade and displaying other "dead" or "suffering" art, a la the Necromance store on Melrose? Would you display a human skin lamp? Would you display a bear skin rug? Would you display lotus slippers that were used to bind someone's feet? In a museum? In your living room?

My answers is: I don't know. No, I wouldn't personally want to see a Gein exhibit. But I can't say it isn't art, of a sort. But because the line is so personal, so objective... I'm fascinated with what people appreciate and what they don't.

How would you define the difference between an art and a craft?

I think we can at least agree that the lampshades were a craft, even if we don't know whether they were also art.

And I hate to say it, but being that he was a Nazi, I think we know what his "statement" would be with that one.

Here's my approximate definition of art and it has almost nothing to do with the product involved (and it has definitely changed a lot over the years; not too long ago I would have been among those wondering why much in SFMOMA is considered art).

Art is the intersection of the ego implicit in standing before the world and saying "this thing, for which I am responsible for placing in this context/configuration/construction/composition, is worthy of your attention simply as the thing it is" and at least one other person saying "you're right."

By that definition, a flasher (well, his appendage at least) is considered art. The cop who busts him is that one person saying "you're right"

Sure, perhaps. And getting arrested doesn't necessarily make something less art. Graffiti can certainly be art but I have no problem with the idea that the person doing it should be arrested if caught.

After all, no one really argues that it could be art (the flashing) when done on a stage. At which points in the millions of ways we can think to iteratively subtly alter that agreed upon starting point does it lose that essence? I would argue that so long as you maintain that connection between the "artist" and the "enabler" then it is still art. Perhaps art that gets you put in the slammer. Quite likely art that I have zero interest in seeing. But then if me liking/approving of something is a required element of being art the world of generally accepted art would get much smaller.