"Just like a big ice cube," he says, "a big blood ice cube."

Since 1991, Quinn has made these self portraits, there are five of them, working with plaster and fibreglass and finally the silicone to get the hollow sculpture which he fills with his blood, extracted over the course of a year, a pint every six weeks. They are frozen and encased in a purpose built glass case, it's own little refrigeration unit like some bizarre cryogenic experiment.

Quinn is in Canberra to deliver the National Gallery of Australia's birthday lecture on October 12, ahead of the opening of Hyper Real, where Self (2011) will be on display along with works from 32 other artists such as Patricia Piccinini, Shaun Gladwell, Sam Jinks, and Ron Mueck.

Hyper Real opens at the NGA on October 20, a blockbuster that charts the evolution of hyperrealism from its inception in the early 1970s. The jawdropping display includes artworks that speak to hyperrealism's focus on ultra-realistic representations of the human form, while simultaneously challenging the perceived boundaries of the genre through video and digital art, virtual reality, and – significantly – Quinn's extraordinary brand of bio-art.

Quinn said the idea for the Self series came about through a frustration with the idea that, at the time, art was about art, trapped in a "formalist eddy".

"I was interested in making art that was about real life … and I thought I would start with myself," he said.

"You explore the world from yourself outwards, that's the arc of all my work."

At Cambridge University he studied Rembrandt's self portraits during his art history course and "thought it would be quite interesting to make a contemporary version of that".

"I was thinking how can I make something that is more real than something made of metal or steel and I was thinking of freezing stuff and it just kind of came to me one morning."

Jaklyn Babington, NGA senior curator of contemporary art, said Quinn's Self exists simultaneously within the past, present and future.

"Quinn's material of choice is blood, and by sculpting with biological matter, he contributes to our understanding of hyperrealism in a unique way.

"The sculpture sits in a limbo – simultaneously alive and dead, real and simulated. It is one of the most uncanny works of recent contemporary practice."

The NGA's Birthday Lecture with Marc Quinn takes place on October 12 at 6pm. Bookings essential.

Hyper Real opens on October 20 and runs until February 18, 2018.

In Panorama on Saturday: Sam Jinks sculpts a vision of loss and human frailty.