White Cube

2005-2007

Semen, acrylic glass, aluminium, refrigeration system

85,5 x 63,5 x 52,5 cm

This work is a 10 centimeter cube containing artist's frozen semen, collected from 2005 to 2007, exposed inside a refrigeration system at a temperature of -30°C. The piece was first showed at the exhibition Deposit - Notes on Density and Knowledge, curated by Paulo Cunha e Silva, held at Porto University in 2007.

Text from the catalog: Leonardo has associated the idea of deposit to the fact of the recent creation of Portugal's first sperm bank, precisely at Oporto University. In this sense the work can be contextualised in a site-specific perspective. However, the paradoxical and abstract nature of the work is understood in the logic of a conceptual art tradition. In fact the piece establish an ironic dialog with artists works of previous generations, like Piero Manzoni Merda di Artista, 1961 and Marc Quinn Self, 1991, who also have used body fluids on their sculptures - faeces and blood, respectively. Insinuating like a monument to life itself, the work questions man's irrational desire to reach immortality.