X-Message-Number: 33161 From: David Stodolsky <> Subject: Dr. Death and his loving couple arouses indignation Date: Thu, 30 Dec 2010 10:27:02 +0100 http://ibyen.dk/kunst/ECE1152522/dr-doed-og-hans-samleje-lig-vaekker-forargelse/ Translation: <http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=da&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fibyen.dk%2Fkunst%2FECE1152522%2Fdr-doed-og-hans-samleje-lig-vaekker-forargelse%2F> Translation, including my corrections: The loving couple are part of the exhibition, which Experimentarium shows next year. The figure will be shown in a closed room. - Photo: Institute for Plastination. - Enlarge image http://multimedia.pol.dk/archive/00507/WBP_Akt01_002_path_507402a.jpg Dr. Death and his loving couple arouses indignation Gunther von Hagens displays his dissection show 'Body Worlds' in Denmark. By Peter Wivel, Europe Correspondent, Berlin A Siberian cold has buried eastern Germany in snow, so it's no easy feat to reach Guben, a small town on the banks of the Oder. The city's former center lies on the other side of the river in Poland, but it was completely destroyed during the War. With the German part of Guben, it is not much better. Everywhere one sees ruins of an industry that did not survive the GDR's collapse in 1989. In this godforsaken place, the German businessman and former anatomy professor Gunther von Hagens has opened the doors to the latest of his three centers for plastination. Plastination is a technique by which von Hagens makes the soft parts of dead people's bodies stable. In an unprecedented way, he has created the preconditions by which our body's anatomy can be illustrated for scientists and other interested people. 30 million visitors You have to cross a parking lot for trucks to get to the Center, a partially renovated former factory building. The atmosphere is unadulterated East German. Over the entrance hangs a red square plate with white letters says that says this is the 'Plastinarium'. A second, smaller sign on the wall indicates the open hours. Otherwise, it betrays nothing, absolutely nothing, of what awaits the person who enters through the doors. The address on Uferstrasse is certainly not one that can be encountered by chance. Nevertheless, it is here, with the German sister institution in Heidelberg, that Gunther von Hagens' sensational exhibition, 'Body Worlds,' goes from strength to strength around the Globe. From Istanbul, where this fall it has been visited by a quarter of a million people, to the Experimentarium in Hellerup, in January. It is estimated that 'Body Worlds,' since its World Premiere in Japan 15 years ago, has been seen by more than 30 million visitors - all in countries that belong to modern Western civilization. An alternative show, 'Bodies Revealed', created using the same principles as von Hagens', was shown in Copenhagen at Tivoli Gardens two years ago. But neither 'Bodies Revealed' or other competing collections, which also make use of von Hagens' inventions, is based on a donor program, as is von Hagens' collection, and that is an absolute prerequisite for any public anatomical collection. This means that the characters exhibited in these other collections may be from people who have been executed, including in China. Dr. Death's Corpse Show It does not mean that von Hagens' 'Body Worlds' has been beyond reproach. Invective has hailed down from medical colleagues, from lawyers, from newspaper editorialists, from priests and god, and every man. Von Hagens' exhibition is referred to constantly as "Dr. Death's Corpse Show' in the German morning newspapers. It would be wrong to say that von Hagens himself has kept a low profile. An example: In 1983, when his preservation technique was still lying on the safe side of anatomical orthodoxy, Catholic clergy in Germany asked von Hagens to plasticize one of the church's relics, a foot bone that stemmed from the sacred and miraculous Hildegard of Bingen (1090 - 1179). This task encouraged von Hagens to propose to the Vatican that he plasticize the papal body, immediately after Pope John Paul's death in April 2005, so it could be preserved for posterity. According to von Hagens, negotiations took too much time and the project failed. Intercourse between two cadavers As an exhibition to enhance von Hagens' provocations, it will no doubt put his competitors to shame. This last object of outrage is a show with different variations of intercourse between two cadavers. The variation, which also Experimentarium guests will enjoy, shows two skinned and scrawny human bodies in a sexual intercourse position. Both in Guben and in the Experimentarium this Act is exhibited in a special cubicle. Experimentarium director, Asger Hoeg, told Politiken: 'It is exhibited in a separate chamber. We write that you should be aware that there may be provocative details here. Scientific? Can't we say that von Hagens staging is unscientific? "He does it in a very scientific way - are you crazy! The exhibition is filled with text and details and pictures, which means that one can not help but be interested in reading about it and become wiser" answers Asger Hoeg. During the exhibition in the disused factory in Guben, you pass two large dissection rooms. At operating tables, there are human bodies, wrapped in opaque plastic. Visitors can follow, through panoramic windows, the smock-clad young staff working laboriously on the parts of the body that sticks out from under the covering. Massacre Preparations With glances, which alternate between an opened anatomical atlas and the body part, the young people are working on, they attach the muscles, arteries, and tendons to the cleaned bones, with a maze of small needles, while keeping the product moist with a formalin sprayer. Photo Here Gunther von Hagens always appears with soft black hat, so he is confusingly similar to the great late German artist Joseph Beuys. Photo: Institute for Plastination Enlarge image Another cleanses intestines removing small fatty lumps. At the end of the process, the designers are busy with the extremely difficult work of fixing the preparation in the desired position. The visitors see a sequence of dissections and animations, whose final result is the organs and bodies presented at an exhibition. This happens, for example, in the form of human bodies, which naturally show an 'explosion diagram' of a human skeleton and all the organs and muscles that once kept the person alive. Von Hagens presents these anatomical plastinations as a contrast to the dead human bodies medical students must dissect as part of their training. Decomposition of these corpses is blocked by formalin. Students call them, according to von Hagens, 'massacre preparations'. From the inside out In an effort to create products that students and others interested in anatomy could identify with more, he got the idea in 1977 of changing the way of preventing the human body from decomposing after death. Until then, scientists had preserved organs or limbs to be used for teaching and research in formalin, alcohol, or other liquids. Von Hagens preserves specimens by getting chemicals into the cells and thus stabilizing them from the inside, instead of from the outside. His first product was a kidney, which he had preserved in formalin. He removed the body fluid with acetone. The acetone dissolved the fat and was later pulled out of the preparation with a high vacuum and replaced by various synthetic materials, including silicone and epoxy. As a Lego toy In this process, von Hagens created a complete copy in plastic of the tissue to be preserved. This copy is as indestructible as a Lego toy. It does not rot and it poses no risk of infection. Von Hagens patented his inventions in 1978 and later. He managed to cure the silicone and, in a most complicated process, shape the preparation into a sculpture that can best be described as 'science fiction'. By the 1990s, his technique became so advanced that even a human body's finest veins could be restored as permanent preparations. Now not only bones, but also tissue to help support the preparation and shape it into natural positions, could be preserved. The previously soft tissue is transformed into a solid plastic. He could now show how a human body, deprived of skin, looked in all sorts of positions and situations. When the skin is gone, the figure is completely anonymous. All his preparations have the same facial expressions and are equally slim. That this does not correspond to reality, is evident from the carcasses, his students sit and work with on at the operating tables in Guben. The Last Supper At his office in Cottbus Strasse in Guben, just on the other side of the railroad line, the local Protestant pastor, Michael Domke, is angered by von Hagens' activities. When von Hagens opened his Plastinarium here four years ago in the small abandoned town, Domke organized a protest movement, but he is now wiser. "We have suspended our activity," he says.'We shall have no more actions, because von Hagens' company leverages our protests to increase its taboo breaking. They are constantly trying to provoke and challenge us. Von Hagens has in particular said that he would like to do 'The Last Supper'. He wants to promote protest. And that is a role we will not play." But exactly why is Domke opposed to 'Body Worlds'? The priest explains: 'This is about marketing human bodies. It is bad. We are in a legal gray area. There is legislation about funerals and the use of cadavers for pathological purposes and research. The exhibition serves no scientific purpose. It is about making money. " "In my opinion, a human life does not end at death," continues Domke. "The dead have a right that their body is not worked on as a material. It is a very long cultural tradition that goes back further than Christianity. The dead must be buried. Here we see the human corpse as a material one can work. It represents a brutalization. Plastinates are educational Not surprisingly, Michael Domke's views are not shared by Gunther von Hagens himself. Politiken via e-mail asked the creator of 'Body Worlds' a series of questions. Von Hagens writes in one of his answers: 'Plastinates shaped in dynamic and athletic positions show the principles of anatomy and physiology in an exceptionally educational manner. The presentation of the sexual act is specially designed for this exhibition. Sex is a part of life. The decisive action which precedes conception is a part of human life '. 'Plastinates here represent the most human of all human actions in a learning context that gives the visitor a never before seen insight into the human body, procreation biology, and sexuality. With donors' approval, we were able to present this aspect of the human saga' wrote von Hagens. Lady Gaga and 'anatomy art' Last summer, it emerged that the American pop singer Lady Gaga would use some of von Hagens' plastinates as a backdrop for one of her upcoming shows. Von Hagens explains the cooperation as follows: "We both demand high aesthetic standards. As the inventor of plastination and creator of genuine aesthetic anatomical teaching preparations, it will be a challenge for me to combine Lady Gaga artistic performances with my scientific preparations, the anatomical plastinates. This combination is what I call 'science art'. " It is no coincidence that Gunther von Hagens always appears in clothes that are confusingly similar to those of the great late German artist Joseph Beuys, including soft black hat and a leather vest. Von Hagens believes that he has much in common with Beuys, but unlike him he is not an artist, but an inventor - of 'anatomy art'. The exhibition in Guben is designed exactly like the traveling exhibition 'Body Worlds', following plans developed by von Hagens and his wife, Dr. Angelina Whalley. The visitors are gradually led into the world created by using plastination. Whalley is "Body Worlds'' director and designer. Donates the body The requirements were approved by an ethics committee, appointed by the California Science Center in 2004. The Committee included theological, ethical, and medical expertise. A bioethics authority, Professor Hans-Martin Sass from the Institute for Cultural Research at Heidelberg University, concluded the same year that all exhibited plastinates were derived from bodies donated for this very purpose. Von Hagens writes to Politiken: "Our Institute for Plastination asks our donors specifically, whether they will sign a consent form. They must answer yes or no to the question about their body being used for public exhibition, or whether it may only be used for private medical education'. Confirms director Asger Hoeg, Experimentarium: "There is a will from each of the persons whose body will be presented at the exhibition. It shows that the donor bequeaths his body to the exhibition. A development In the Plastinarium in Guben, before one comes to the rooms with plastinates of entire human bodies, you go through a few halls, where anatomy's history is summarized. Here we see that von Hagens' preservation idea goes back to the Egyptian mummies and reached a provisional climax during dissections up to and during the Enlightenment. The German anatomist is not taboo breaking. He represents a step in the development of illustrating the human's physical structure. The next step will undoubtedly be the Network's many opportunities for an interactive graphical representation of our insides. Peter Holm-Nielsen, an associate professor and specialist in anatomical pathology at the Institute of Anatomy, Aarhus University, says in an interview on von Hagens' impact, that his show is fantastic. Transverse and longitudinal slices The plastics anatomical structures will not only be an asset in teaching, but also as training material, for example, in specialist courses, which increasingly are sought by clinicians, he says. "I can vouch for the anatomical. It is a unique technique," says Holm-Nielsen. "There are many perspectives on it and also some moral issues. But if the story is in order, as is apparent from von Hagens, one can say that it is a great way to see the human organism under conditions that normally can not exist. " "Von Hagens has many unusual preparations, both transverse and longitudinal slices of people, including individual organs. Some say that it is to popularize it all and that it is all money and business. But from an anatomic view, it must be said that he makes anatomy much more accessible than the normal preparations do, "said Holm-Nielsen. "For self-promotional" Prof. Dr. Friedrich Paulsen, who is chairman of the Anatomical Society of Berlin, broadly agrees with his Danish colleague. He says to Politiken: "Generally speaking, the public is very interested in the anatomical collections. So, from that standpoint, Mr. Gunther von Hagens' has a good collection, although it basically is just plastic. It is visited by many people. " "It shows that there is a tremendous need for people to know more about anatomy. Personally, I find, however, von Hagens' exhibition exhibitionistic and too self-promotional." "You should not make these dead people's bodies as chess players or riders. We should focus directly on the anatomy and structure, without shaping them. But broadly, I would say it's good. It contributes to some extent to making people better educated and getting them to deal more with their own bodies," says Professor Paulsen. For Sale The Guben collection is also a sales exhibition. Here, professional buyers choose between products, showing everything from human fetuses to smoker's lungs, to hearts whose chambers consist exclusively of the tissues of blood vessels. A special technique has also made it possible for von Hagens to cut the human body in millimeter-thin slices. Von Hagens says to Politiken that these products are only sold to "qualified users', i. e. universities, schools, museums, or hospitals that need them for teaching and research purposes. In addition, his company manufactures so-called 'anatomy art'. "These are reproductions of slices of both humans and animals," said von Hagens. 'These articles are made for collectors or people outside the medical world with an interest in anatomy'. Acquitted Besides the aesthetic and psychological resistance to Gunther von Hagens' plastinates, he also faces barriers in our legal culture, our piety, and in our religious traditions. Corpses must be buried, in principle. It is required not only by health authorities, but also by ecclesiastical institutions, for whom body and soul belong together. Some German states prohibit long-term public display of corpses, unless it serves a special medical purpose. Von Hagens compares plastinates with "dry corpses", such as Egyptian mummies, archaeological mummies, and skeletons that have always been exhibited, and even carried in processions through German cities at religious festivals. In Germany, there have been attempts to ban 'Body Worlds' using the laws concerning graves and human dignity. But either the indictment has been dropped or von Hagens has been acquitted. --------- Fact B ox -------- Title: Body Worlds Location: Experimentarium Address: Tuborg Havnevej in Hellerup Date: 11 January until 8 August. Gunther von Hagens Born in 1945 as Gunther Gerhard Liebchen in the German part of the current Poland. The family fled to Greiz, West of Dresden. He grew up and received his medical training in the GDR. In 1969, he tried to flee to West Germany and was sentenced to a prison sentence. His former prison cell is displayed in the building in Guben. The Federal Republic bought him free in 1970. Received a Medical doctorate in Heidelberg in 1975. In 1977 he invented the plastination technique on which he has since taken a number of patents. Married for the second time in 1992, with a former student, Dr. Angelina Whalley. She is currently the driving force behind the exhibition 'Body Worlds'. Established the first Institute for Plastination in Heidelberg in 1993. Later followed a similar one in Dalian in China. It prepares especially large animals like elephants and giraffes. In 2006, he opened his center in Guben on the Oder River on the border with Poland. In 2002, von Hagens performed the first public dissection in 170 years in London. In 2009, he exhibited for the first time two plastinates having sex. Gunther von Hagens has been visiting professor at Dalian in China and at the Dental Faculty at New York University. 11,000 people have bequeathed him their dead bodies. 792 of them have died. David Stodolsky Skype: davidstodolsky Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=33161