Jeroen Eisinga
Stedelijk Museum Schiedam
When Zhang Huan in his early work 12m², 1994, spread fish oil and honey on his naked body to attract flies, then sat for an hour in a filthy public toilet in Beijing, this was a silent form of social protest. For his film Springtime, 2010–11, the Dutch artist Jeroen Eisinga did something similar but with a completely different intention. The artist had his upper body and head totally covered by honeybees after sprinkling a liquid containing a hormone from a queen bee on it. Although this is an established practice, known as bee bearding, with its own competitions and record holders, it remains