A mystery figure has been making people reconsider how they view homeless people in an artist's new project in London

Maxwell Rushton, the artist who created works out of his own blood, is working with bags again – this time crumpled, apparently afflicted sculptures made out of black sacks, crouched to resemble homeless people sheltering on the streets of London.

These figures are empty, the idea aimed at finding out how passers-by react to the unsettling proposition of seeing a shroud hunched over on a corner. “Some people had no idea what it was and some people just walked past,” says Rushton, whose bin liners encase jesmonite casts.

“We had this one chap who came over and tore it to pieces...he tore the binbag off it. I had to run over and calm him down.

“I wanted to create a visual cue that would offer that some impact. It very much needed to exist in the same context around people in the street and passers-by. I knew that it would, inevitably, have people completely disregard it, as we often do.

“It’s difficult to handle for anyone but you get really good at it – you get too good at it, so good at it that you find it funny. You don’t really give a s*** about someone suffocating in a binbag on the streets. That was surprising.”

Based on Rushton’s own experience of apologising to a binbag when he mistook it for a homeless person last year, the creation has certainly drawn people in. Some remained indifferent, but others peered over the work or tried to comfort it.

“That sort of weird feeling of dread followed me for a few weeks and I wondered what to do with it,” says the artist, recalling how Left Out began. “How I saw the homeless after that was significantly different.”

His emotions echo those of some of the people who have seen the bag. “I’m definitely not exempt from trying to shut out that side of my day when I am confronted with a version of myself that has had a difficult time.”

The most resonant reaction, for Rushton, came from a man on Westminster Bridge voicing his concern that the homeless might be seen as garbage. “It was really lovely to hear the thoughts inside his head that I had inside mine. There are so many reasons why I make art but having someone understand a piece in the exact terms that I’ve made it in is a really encouraging thing.

“The people who didn’t know what it was and rushed over…that was really fantastic to see them immediately want to help this object which they thought was a person in distress.”

With the number of rough sleepers rising, exposing the predicament of the homeless could be the first step to increasing awareness and action among a naturally avoidant society.

• Watch the project video on Facebook.

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