"The supportive"Gunther von Hagen’s Body Worlds

The objectives of the IfP can be summarized as follows:

1.      Improving overall anatomical instruction

 The IfP produces high-quality educational specimens for anatomical instruction at universities and other teaching institutions.

2.      Improving awareness of medical issues, particularly among the general public

The IfP produces plastinates aimed at educating non-medical professionals and restores public access to the anatomy of the human body.

3.      Popularizing and developing plastination techniques

The IfP disseminates plastination expertise around the world, allowing other teaching institutions to profit from this unique process. The IfP also pursues scientific objectives and strives continually to develop and refine the techniques of Plastination and the resulting anatomical specimens. It is aided in these endeavors by visiting scientists and scholarship holders from national and international universities.


Sourcer from:
http://www.bodyworlds.com/en/institute_for_plastination/mission_objectives.html

PROVOCATIVE BODIES

A Visual Analysis of Gunther von Hagens' Plastinates
by Professor Michael Coventry
Summer 2005

                Plastination is a technique developed and patented by German anatomist Gunther von Hagens in the 1990s in which the liquids of the body are forcibly replaced with a polymer, creating an entirely stable cadaver that is posed creatively to highlight aspects of human anatomy.The plastinated figures are arranged artistically, but von Hagens focuses on their scientific merit. His BodyWorlds exhibit has been shown in Europe in many venues, but has been carefully couched in scientific terms here in the United States.  It can be break down into few categories such as mortality, remediation, mediation and more. Please check the attached photos to have a clearer point of view.      
              
              

   However, few issues are being bought up such as the source of bodies is an issue bound up with politics, religion, and the historical association of anatomy with body-snatching  Also, some of the viewer questioned about whether or not the donors have consented, von Hagens faces the larger ethical issue of whether he is treating the human body with dignity and respect and Body Worlds is criticized for profiting from the body.           

    

                In short, they are displayed in conventional spaces and follow traditional principles of museum theory, yet their dynamism goes far beyond a strictly clinical nature and characterizes them as aesthetic sculptures rather than cadavers. Plastinates provoke an emotional connection that is allowed because their poses and their preservation allow visitors to suspend the clinical detachment that is required of those in the medical professions.


Source from:
http://www8.georgetown.edu/centers/cndls/applications/postertool/index.cfm?fuseaction=poster.display&posterID=1976

Germany's terminally-ill 'Dr. Death' to put own body on show

09 January 2011

           The German anatomist dubbed "Doctor Death", who has turned stomachs worldwide preserving and displaying dead bodies, said Wednesday he is terminally ill and plans to exhibit his own corpse.

         Gunther von Hagens, 65, told the Bild mass circulation daily he is suffering from incurable Parkinson's disease and intends to have his dead body put on display to "welcome" visitors to his exhibition.

       

          Hagens is no stranger to controversy. His latest wheeze was to offer preserved body parts for sale in a so called "supermarket of death." In a process invented by Hagens, the body parts are skinned and preserved with a synthetic resin, laying bare the naked muscles, nerves and tendons underneath.

Source from: 

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/germanys-terminallyill-dr-death-to-put-own-body-on-show-2179927.html?origin=internalSearch

Gunther von Hagens presents Crucifix for Easter

by Adam Shervin
06 April 2012

           It’s a gory portrayal of the crucifixion, created from casts of human bone and blood vessels, which looks certain to offend Easter church-goers. But Dr Gunther von Hagens, the controversial anatomist, insists that his latest work is not blasphemous but a true expression of Christian values.

         The German scientist, notorious for his Body Worlds exhibition of preserved human corpses, has brought his plastination technique to bear on the iconic image of Christ on the cross.
  
         Describing his Crucifix as “a piece of religious anatomy art,” von Hagens argued that his work “draws on Christian traditions, with the skeleton symbolising frailty, finitude and human transience, while the vascular system, in which the blood is transported around the body, stands for the miracle of life.”

        Von Hagens said: “There have been many controversial representations of Jesus which I think lack fundamental respect for the Christian religion. Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ has strong deviations from the New Testament account and Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ contains extremely sadistic scenes.The sculpture showed “Jesus as if he had been frozen in time, between death and decay, ever since the moment he was nailed to the cross.” 

Source from:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/gunther-von-hagens-presents-crucifix-for-easter-7622093.html?origin=internalSearch