Bodies-The Exhibition
Read more articles on Life's Nuances and Let Me Share With You.February 4, 2008
Posted by Karen Amato Schwartz
February 4, 2008
Posted by Karen Amato Schwartz
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So, has this exhibit come anywhere near your city? If so, and if you saw it, what did you think? I saw it on Saturday and knew that it was worth at least one blog here on the Compendium.
For those of you who aren’t aware of it, it’s basically an exhibition on the human body, with a different twist that all specimens were once as alive as you and I. This fact has been causing much controversy, and has even resulted in at least one resignation from the staff of the museum here that is sponsoring the exhibition. The protest has focused on the fact that the individuals whose bodies are used were indigent, often homeless people who had no idea that their bodies would be used in such a manner.
It does not seem right, but such a use will go far in educating the medical profession as well as the public about mysteries of the human body.
The exhibit consists of a half dozen rooms, each highlighting a different aspect of the body, such as skeletal, respiratory, circulatory, etc. Dissections, cross sections, bones, organs and such are thus displayed in healthy and non-healthy conditions and even birth defects in aborted fetuses are clearly visible. The entire nervous system (and nothing else) is stretched out in one case, while, in another, a good amount of intestine loops around and around. One memorable display shows what appears to be two people holding hands, but upon examination, it is from just one “specimen” whose skeletal system was removed and placed beside the remaining muscular system. Other views of breast cancer and diseases bring home just how devastatingly ugly they are, even just visually.
Kids have said they find it “creepy” and some adults won’t venture there, believing it to be unnerving, if not morbid. But I found it neither. It was all a bit brighter than I expected, with each case strongly lit and well explained. The preservation methods left the specimens looking almost plasticized, so I did not feel like I was in the midst of surgery-which I could not have handled.
What I found most interesting was that everything was preserved so well in original form, and that there is so much squeezed inside of us, all working in perfect co-ordination. We learn and read about our bodies through our entire lives, and think we understand, but seeing it in such detail can’t help but reinforce our fascination with life.
By the time a visitor reaches the reproductive area, and is reminded that for 30 minutes after conception, we all began as a single cell, they probably have re-connected with any spiritual or religious learning. It’s not difficult, when one takes into consideration the miracles that are us, every moment of every life. Go to see this if you get the opportunity.
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