NYU Prof Implanting Camera in Head

New York University photography professor Wafaa Bilal is turning his own head into a camera. The professor plans to have a camera surgically implanted into the back of his head, which will record an image every minute for an artwork commissioned by a Qatar museum, the Wall Street Journal reports. University chiefs worried about privacy issues are still working on ground rules, but the professor has agreed to cover the lens while on campus.

The Iraqi-born professor's previous projects include 2007's Domestic Tension—originally titled Shoot an Iraqi—in which he spent a month living in a Chicago gallery while members of the public fired paintballs at him day and night. "He's not really a photographer, he's not really a video artist, he's not really a performance artist," a curator at the Qatar museum says. "Whatever artwork he creates, he doesn't want people to just look at it, he wants them to participate in it." (More Wafaa Bilal stories.)