The Manchester Hermit at Manchester Museum 27th June – 5th August

This summer Manchester Museum will host artist Ansuman Biswas as he lives the life of a hermit.

The Calcutta-born artist has been picked from hundreds of applicants to spend forty days and nights confined to a room at the top of the imposing Gothic Tower. His residency will provoke questions about why we choose to save physical objects while allowing species and cultures to disappear.

Biswas is famous for his varied career which has included living with shamans in the Gobi desert, living with minstrels in India, living in a cave in the countryside for the National Trust and being sealed into a wooden box for ten days with no food or water.

During his hermitage he will be unable to leave the room, eating only the rice and vegetables he takes in with him without either entertainment or company, apart from an online blog through which he will share his daily thoughts on one of 40 objects selected from the 4.5million exhibits at the museum.

Manchester Museum is one of the country's leading museums and homes a number of live exhibits such as frogs, lizards and snakes alongside the mummies, stuffed animals and dinosaur bones. But as the museum prepares to become the first in the country to host a person as a living exhibit, we wonder – is this a step too far?!