Auto-destructive art

Auto-destructive art is a term invented by the artist Gustav Metzger in the early
1960s and put into circulation by his article Machine, Auto-creative and Autodestructive Art in the summer 1962 issue of the journal Ark. From 1959, Metzger
had made work by spraying acid onto sheets of nylon as a protest against nuclear
weapons. The procedure produced rapidly changing shapes before the nylon was
consumed, making the work simultaneously auto-creative and auto-destructive.
In 1966, Metzger and others organised the Destruction in Art Symposium in
London, which was followed by another in New York in 1968. The symposium was
accompanied by public demonstration of Auto-destructive art including the
burning of Skoob Towers by John Latham. These were towers of books and
Latham's intention was to demonstrate directly his view that Western culture was
burned out. In 1960, the Swiss artist Jean Tinguely made the first of his selfdestructive machine sculptures, Hommage a New York, which battered itself to
pieces in the Sculpture Garden of the Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Pete Townshend of The Who would later relate destroying his guitar on stage to
auto-destructive art. Japanese Noise/Performance Art band the Hanatarash
would create entire performances out of destroying their sets with power tools
and with other non-musical instruments, and the sound produced being the focus,
essentially producing 'art' based on complete destruction.
(Taken from Wikipedia)