Since this is also the literature channel, I'll answer the Bible and the Quran. That also includes the Tanakh, of course. I actually have some problem classifying them as art, given that they're so poorly written. But they're works of fiction anyway, and rather shocking ones at that.

How can I believe in God when just last week I got my tongue caught in the roller of an electric typewriter? --Woody Allen

I haven't seen it myself but I'd say "Sex and Death" by Teemu Mäki. It's a video in which he kills a cat with an axe and masturbates on the cat's body.

"If we are going to teach creation science as an alternative to evolution, then we should also teach the stork theory as an alternative to biological reproduction." (Judith Hayes)

@outi: Do you really consider this video as a piece of "art"? If not, why do you advertise here for it? (Because this is exactly what you are doing, if you write out the name of the artist and his piece of "art" here).

I've read and watched same kind off things of Coum Transmissions and offcourse its art... Otherwise it wouldnt be posted here would it?

Art can be shocking and according to many artists it SHOULD be shocking. Ever watched the Skinny Puppy video of Worlock? i consider that a shocking piece of art and for some, like you apparently, Elvis moving his hips might even be too shocking... Its just what your used to and what you've seen. I've watched this video posted by outi btw..

what I recently saw is Genesis P-orridge, transforming his own body. here is the url to his site, I didnt directly give the url, just browse for it if your interested. http://www.genesisp-orridge.com/ and just search through it.. he did other weird stuff too

“We should burn all libraries and allow to remain only that which everyone knows by heart. A beautiful age of the legend would then begin.” - Hugo Ball
“The rest, called literature, is a dossier of human imbecility for the guidance of future professors.” - Tristan Tzara

@guidonl85: Don't know how you come to the completely ridiculous assumption that I could find Elvis moving his hipps shocking, sexuality in general is not in the least shocking for me. Sexuality intermingled with gruesomeness against animals is, of course, something completely different. That you and perhaps outi consider such acts of gruesomeness as "art" (Why? Just because it is/should be shocking? According to this definition of you, also photographs of concentration camps would be "art" for you?) and show this understanding by posting here, does not mean in the least that "its art" for me and the general public.

I don't think it's my job to make a line of what is art and what is not. I just simply put that in the "art" category because Kiasma (a museum of contemporary art) bought the video in its collections. And as I have never even seen the video it's even harder to say if it can be any kind of art or not. If it was up to me I wouldn't really consider most of the things in that museum "art"

"If we are going to teach creation science as an alternative to evolution, then we should also teach the stork theory as an alternative to biological reproduction." (Judith Hayes)

Style is never out of fashion.

Well, of course it would not be commercial advertising mentionning a well known artists name here, but especially if one mentions a relatively unknown persons name in a forum like this, some people get curious and want to know more about the artist and his art, which usually means that they looking up his name with google or some other search engine. From a technical point of view this principally (but of course on a much smaller scale) is just the same as placing an advertisment for this guy in a newspaper, for example.

every well-known artist was one unknown .

Style is never out of fashion.

The Life and Death of Kevin Carter

Its a picture of young girl dying and a vulture waiting to eat her....

http://www.mukto-mona.com/Articles/kevin_carter/sudan_child.htm

Three months later the photographer(Kevin Carter) committed suicide due to depression..

Ich bin zu alt, um nur zu spielen.
Zu jung, um ohne Wunsch zu sein.

@dresstoimpress: Sure, but not every unknown becomes a well known artist, even if he or she is good enough, has enough talent.

I'm a huge fan of Genesis P. in all his incarnations... once upon a time I found it shocking but suspect I have become desensitised (or enlightened!) The only work I can say I still struggle with is De Sade's 120 Days of Sodom, simply because it seems the most provocatively nihilistic text ever written (so much so that even Sade himself gave up the process of writing it in a kind of numbed way). As for other "shocking" things, I am rather interested in a post-romantic/decadent approach to extreme experiences, particularly in the work of writers such as J.G. Ballard, William Burroughs and Kathy Acker, my own personal satanic trinity

errrr... if you asked, then it was the footprint on the earth as a logo for mailfriends

It is not WHAT you give, but HOW you give that counts!

well I didnt think it was shocking but the uppity people in my town do..

It was a sculpture called the Penis tree..

will see if I can find a link..

Ring the bells that still can ring.
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack, a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in.

~ Leonard Cohen ~

I agree!!!

when are they going to stop making me mean more than I say? - Beckett

Don't you dare putting that here

when are they going to stop making me mean more than I say? - Beckett

ah some guy who had made an exhibition of corpses and body parts of dead ppl... read it in the newspaper :-0

You mean the anatomy exhibition in which they don't have skin?! Otherwise it sounds pretty much against the law.

when are they going to stop making me mean more than I say? - Beckett

" la mort de marat " I always feel like crying when i see it .. it's sooooo pure *sniff*

Eat me !

Some of the modern impressionist artwork at the museum in Fort Worth was pretty shoddy..

Ya...iron pilar built at Delhi ie about 800 to 900 yera old pilar which have no junk.i.e the work of art
i never seen.

'Korperwelten', some mentioned. Looks interesting.
I still vote 'the cloaca'. Not so much the machine, but it's shocking that people buy that shit. Literally, I mean.

Daar is de lente, daar is de zon bijna, maar ik denk dat ze weldra zal komen. De fallus impudicus staat al in bloei En de blaadjes krijgen bomen. M'n vrouw en m'n kat zijn allebei krols en de klokken vertrekken naar Rome

In the name of art, nothing is shocking in my view.

Some drunk unworthy of knowing artist displaying female genitals. Not sure who was most embarrassed, male or female and everyone drank quite a lot of wine.

BogMyrtle
(Does it really grow only in Scotland and Ireland?)

körperwelten (body worlds) by Gunther von Hagens is one the one hand shocking (especially the pregnant women and the unborn babies) but on the other hand it is also interesting to see how our body is built with all the veins and muscles. I had to go to this exhibition with my biology class

If the primates that we came from had known that someday politicians would come out of the gene pool, they'd stayed up in the trees and written evolution off as a bad idea.

DEAD CHRIST of Ganz Holbein jr

Upon my faith!!

Probably the idea of watching somebody die. I just read this and I can't imagine something more tasteless.

You don't need to control him.... you need to unleash him!

I think people 'll estimate his last work

Upon my faith!!

It's a very nice idea of Schneider. If he can find someone willing to do so it could actually be very 'nice'. Death is part of life. I wonder if someone ever gave birth in a museum as a 'performance'?

Style is never out of fashion.