Chilean-born artist Marco Evaristti has come under fire for trying to starve three little piglets to death as part of a controversial art installation meant to raise awareness about animal welfare.

Marco Evaristti sparked controversy when he originally announced plans for his “And Now You Care?” exhibition, but he really attracted criticism both from animal rights activists and the general public when it actually became a reality. Located in a former butcher’s warehouse in the Meatpacking District of Copenhagen, “And Now You Care?” featured three little piglets on a pile of hay, trapped in a cage made up of two metal shopping carts and surrounded by paintings of slaughtered pigs and the Danish flag. It was already an unsettling display, but it was his plan to only give the piglets water and let them starve to death that really shocked everyone.

Photo: Matthieu Petiard/Unsplash

Pushing back against his critics, Marco Evaristti explained that his provocative installation was a commentary about animal welfare in Denmark, one of the world’s largest pork exporters. It was designed to “wake up the Danish society” to the mistreatment of pigs in the Northern European country where tens of thousands of pigs die because of poor conditions every year.

“And Now You Care?” opened to the public last Friday and Evaristti estimated that it would take the piglets about five days to die of starvation, during which time he himself would abstain from any food or drinks, in what can only be described as a bizarre display of solidarity. But his plans were thwarted on Saturday when the three little pigs disappeared.

The controversial artist told police that while the exhibition space was being cleaned on Saturday morning, members of an animal rights organization came to check on the animals. They closed the door while the cleaning people were cleaning the toilet, and when the latter came out, the piglets were gone. Police were notified, but they have yet to charge anyone with theft, and Evaristti doesn’t expect the animals to be returned.

The “And Now You Care?” exhibition closed its gates on Tuesday because Evaristti said it was “boring” without the starving piglets, but that did little to appease his critics. Although animal rights organizations agreed with the message he was trying to convey, they did not appreciate his methods. One activist called the Chilean native a “perverted artist”, and Evaristti retaliated by threatening to take legal action against her.

“We understand Marco Evaristti’s intentions with his exhibition, but it is not acceptable to protest one form of animal cruelty by committing another,” Gitte Buchhave, director of World Animal Protections’s Danish arm, said in a statement. “We have long criticized the conditions in Danish pig farming and will continue to do so, but this is not the way to create change.”