Any performer who undertakes an escape stunt is making a calculated risk. Sometimes, the challenges they set themselves might be a little outside their physical abilities. Sometimes, an act will fail. Belgian performance artist Mikes Poppe had to call off his stunt trying to free himself from a chain buried in a massive block of marble. Poppe spent 19 days trying to escape before being cut out by a safety team.

Even though he wasn’t able to pull off the stunt, Poppe is still keeping a positive attitude about the trick.

“This block is symbolic of history – the history of art which I am trying to free myself from,” he said. “I discovered that this is not possible – to free yourself from the history of art.”

Maybe that’s just a poetic spin on failure, but it’s still a good one.