French artist Abraham Poincheval 'becomes a chicken' for three-week egg hatching performance

A French artist whose previous work includes living inside a rock is set to “become a chicken” by incubating ten eggs with his own body heat.

Abraham Poincheval will sit wrapped in an incubating blanket above the eggs for up to 26 days as part of an art performance piece.

He will stay a glass vivarium at the Palais de Tokyo museum in Paris, where he can be watched by visitors.

Poincheval, 44, began the performance - titled "Oeuf" (Egg) - on Wednesday.

"I will, broadly speaking, become a chicken," he told the BBC.

He will not sit on the eggs directly but will instead have a container under his seat.

He will be wrapped in an insulating blanket designed and will only be able to stand and leave the eggs for 30 minutes a day

As a result he will have to use a box beneath him when he needs to use the toilet.

It is expected to take between 21 and 26 days for the eggs to hatch.

This latest performance comes just weeks after Poincheval's "Pierre" (Stone) – during which he lived inside a hollowed-out limestone rock shaped to fit his body.

He has also spend two weeks in 2014 living inside a hollowed-out bear - eating worms and beetles to mirror the animal's diet.

The artist believes the best way to understand objects is not from a distance, but by entering them.