Von Hagens poses with pal
Body business booms to meet exhibitions’ needs / Source of cadavers becoming bone of contention — I know the Chinese are competitive, but this is a bit much. “You want corpses? How many? We get you best price!”
The mastermind behind this operation is Dr. Gunther von Hagens, a 61-year-old German scientist whose “Body Worlds” show has attracted 20 million people worldwide over the past decade and has taken in over $200 million by displaying preserved, skinless human corpses with their well-defined muscles and sinewy tissues.
But now with millions of people flocking to see “Body Worlds” and similar exhibitions, a ghastly new underground industry has emerged in China.
With little government oversight, an abundance of cheap medical school labor and easy access to cadavers, at least 10 other Chinese body factories have opened in the past few years. These companies are regularly filling exhibition orders, shipping cadavers to Japan, South Korea and the United States.
These “Body Worlds” shows are popping up all over the USA. Here are some details from the one in Cleveland that was put on last year:
Body Worlds 2 is a presentation of the unique process of plastination, invented in 1977 by Dr. Gunther von Hagens, said Georgina Gomez, spokeswoman and development manager for the Institute for Plastination North American Body Donor Office.
Dr. von Hagens invented plastination in 1977 while at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. The process involves dehydrating bodies in acetone baths, then replacing the bodily fluids with plastics and polymers, thus preserving anatomical specimens, Gomez said.
Founding the Institute for Plastination in 1993 in Heidelberg, Dr. von Hagens began to offer plastinated specimens for exhibition through the Body Worlds and Body Worlds 2 exhibitions.
Body Worlds Website — How many ways can you spell creepy?
A TV series called ‘Anatomy for Beginners’ has just finished showing here in Oz.
Dr von Hagens performs disections on actual people (dead first of course) while being narated by Prof John Lee.
Its a BBC production and well worth a look – http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/A/anatomy/
Sure, it doesn’t pull any punches and is very graphic, but the extra appreciation for our bodies that such a show invokes is far superior than the usual trash documentaries about the human body.
The 4th programme would be enough to get most guys crossing their legs and groaning when the disection of a testicle still attached to its owner takes place 😮
Ok, I’m an artist. Some of my art is pretty disturbing, and I even get hate mail from people time to time. This kind of seems wrong to me. When people donate their bodies to science, I doubt they imagine they’ll be sittin’ on a skinless horse in some museum. Plus, wouldn’t this lend itself to a lot of murders for cash?
I heard a report on NPR about this (link) and thought it would be interesting, and for zen… what about someone KNOWING that it would be for that use?
J/P=?
We had a open day at one of the local Universities a couple of days ago, and the anatomy department had parts of bodies that had been through the plastination, And my mother and I found it very interesting, literally a hands on approach, compared to looking at sketches in a book.
and #2, they know full well what happens to their bodies when they donate them to Dr. Gunther, it’s not like he takes bodies from morgues.
#1 : Anatomy for Beginners wasn’t actually a BBC production, it was actually Channel 4 that made it. (they are our only non-cable/sat alternative to BBC, channel 3 doesn’t really count as most of their stuff is not their own, and I think it is really Soap Opera alley) I doubt the BBC would ever make a show like that, for example…
On a BBC show called Top Gear which is a show about cars hosted by a genius (look the show up, amazing so it is!) starts some of the shows by breaking down some of the complaints they had in the last week, one of my favourites broke down something along the lines of: 4 or 5 non-PC comments each got 1 or 2 complaints each and they accidentally set a caravan on fire and they got some tremendous amount of complaints, like 100 or there-abouts.
But yes, the point I am attempting to make is that the BBC couldn’t show that, but Channel 4 are more into the shocking/disturbing shows that the core viewers of the BBC would have a heart attack if they even caught an advert for it.
My mistake. It makes it somewhat confusing for those opf us living outside of the UK to have all your channels basically named the same thing with only a numeral to differentiate them.
Anyway, I LOVE Top Gear (which was shown an hour before the Anatomy show) and I can’t stand shows about cars 🙂 The hosts are fantastic!
They are both shown on the SBS network here, which is more or less an alternative channel with lots of overseas (but non US) content, late night soft core porno, and documentary series like the show I mentioned above. Its pretty much the only channel I bother watching any more since all the others have become dumbed down so much they make Big Brother look like programming for intelectuals 🙁
I remember watching his show on TV in the UK when he performed a live autopsy on a male corpse. The guy performed it wearing his long jacket and strange hat. It caused a lot of controversy and although interesting was a little bit creepy watching this guy enthusiastically chopping up a corpse on live TV infront of a studio audience.
Have we crossed that line between natural curiosity and the macabre? Maybe the element that’s missing in all of this is respect. If I donate my body to science it won’t be so that some side-show guy can make money from thrill seekers, not that I’ll probably care at that point.
OMG! Is that Calista Flockhart?
If Body Worlds comes to your town… please protest it! Don’t just talk about how bad it is… protest it! I did here in Houston. I even went before the Houston City Council. You can do it! Do the internet research on it, put it on posters, and stand outside the museum that is hosting this extremely disrespectful exhibit! It is not science or art… it is a non-compassionate circus freak show for profit!