Gunther von Hagens' BODY WORLDS: The Original Exhibition of Real Human Bodies
So I finally managed to get out to see Body Worlds with Fitz on Saturday. Of course we went on the last weekend, it would have been truly shocking if we had actually managed to get out to this exhibit in a timely fashion. It was good that the museum was open for 63 hours straight for the exhibits final weekend or I don't think we would have made it at all.
We ventured on over to down town Milwaukee on Saturday evening at about 9pm, thinking that we would purchase our timed tickets and go back out into the city and explore a bit. This was not to be the case. When we got off the exit ramp to the rear of the Bradley Center we ran into what I thought was concert or game traffic. The roads were a brickyard. When the traffic showed no signs of abating I realize with dawning horror that we ran smack into Riverfest traffic. The roads were littered with the drunken masses snarling traffic even on streets that were not blocked off. We had to detour all the way into Riverwest, jog east to the lake and circle around to get anywhere near where we wanted to be. We managed to be right near the Midwest Express building when the fireworks started to go off meaning that the drunken masses lurching around were now lurching around whilst watching the god-damn SKY and not where the hell they were walking. We nearly creamed several co-eds when they suddenly flailed into traffic watching the pretty lights in the sky with their jaws hanging open. The world may have been a better place if we had...
We finally reached the museum almost an hour and a half from when we left the restaurant. It was weird being in the museum so late at night and I was absolutely appalled at the amount of people that were attending the exhibit. Fitz bought our tickets for the 11:15 queue and we wandered around the first floor exhibits for a bit. We queued up at about 11pm with about 200 other people. We all filed into the small exhibit hall that Bodyworlds was housed in on the second floor. I really felt that the hall was too small to accommodate the amount of people viewing the exhibit. The temperature in the rooms was in the mid-eighties and the air was stagnant. I think the environmental systems just couldn't handle the strain.
People were lined up to see each body or display case in the exhibit and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. I suppose it is just the propensity for humans to herd, but with the heat, and the stupid reigning around me I just couldn't stand it any more and I broke free and just walked right up to the first body, ignoring the line. You would have thought I had invented the wheel right before their bovine eyes...
I was impressed by the exhibit itself, the sheer audacity of working with a deceased human form as a media for expression must have been a significant hurdle to overcome for Von Hagens. I felt that in most cases the bodies were displayed with all due reverence. I can see how this method of preserving bodies will soon become valuable for teaching medical personnel. The effect of the display was of course mostly a still life, you could see what happens in the body in motion or at rest. This was an invaluable learning experience for most of the population that has no experience with anatomy courses.
My favourite parts of the exhibit were seeing the artificial implants such as the heart valve and hip replacement display. Seeing the implants in situ was very exciting. I can now picture how they function in a living person and see the harmony in seeing man's creation working in unison with the universes'.
My least favourite parts of the exhibit were all the sheeple. As I get older I become less and less able to stand the mass of irritatingly stupid humanity. When we were looking at a comparison of healthy and smoker's lungs a woman next to me blathered to her companion that it was gross but it wasn't enough to make her give up her precious deathsitcks. However, when she read the display card that explained the health effects of smoking on the lungs and the fact that it shortens ones life span by an average of five years she was SURPRISED. This middle aged woman had somehow missed that SMOKING makes you DEADER QUICKER. I felt like encouraging her habit, hopefully before she managed to breed.
All the portions of exhibit seemed imformative and well done. It was not spooky or grotesque as some people have mentioned. The only portion I found a little macabre was the "Flying Man" I couldn't figure out why splitting his musculature bilaterally showed anything or taught anything different than any of the other views. The grinning skull and jaunty little hat might have something to do with the effect on the viewer.
All in all it was a good exhibit, though I found it draining. It wasn't something to see on a lark, though it was something that should be seen, kind of like the Holocaust museum. We finished viewing the exhibit about 2am.
The whole museum was open during the late hours so to decompress we wandered the rest of the exhibits. I pressed the famed snake button a few times, so I felt better. It was odd, and kind of spooky walking around the museum in the early morning hours, but I would be thrilled if they had it open like that more often. For us late nighters it was an unexpected boon.
It did have its irritating moments though....
I finally snapped when we were in front of the T-Rex eating the Triceratops exhibit. Three teenage girls came running by singing some insipid country song at the top of their shrill little lungs and they stampeded up to the balcony above the main floor jumping and making stupid comments like "HEY ITS A DINOSAUR! HEY MR.DINOSAUR!!!", there was an older gentleman who walked in at about the same time and I just couldn't take it for another second. I turned my face up to the balcony and raised my voice to be heard over the racket. "Hey Guys!" I exclaimed, and watched as three heads poked over the rail. "SHUT UP!", "This is a museum, not a playground, if you want to play, there is a street outside!" When the older gentleman embarrassedly collected them and hussled them away I realized that he was their father or some such. I tried, but upon review, I still don't feel bad about it....
We ventured on over to down town Milwaukee on Saturday evening at about 9pm, thinking that we would purchase our timed tickets and go back out into the city and explore a bit. This was not to be the case. When we got off the exit ramp to the rear of the Bradley Center we ran into what I thought was concert or game traffic. The roads were a brickyard. When the traffic showed no signs of abating I realize with dawning horror that we ran smack into Riverfest traffic. The roads were littered with the drunken masses snarling traffic even on streets that were not blocked off. We had to detour all the way into Riverwest, jog east to the lake and circle around to get anywhere near where we wanted to be. We managed to be right near the Midwest Express building when the fireworks started to go off meaning that the drunken masses lurching around were now lurching around whilst watching the god-damn SKY and not where the hell they were walking. We nearly creamed several co-eds when they suddenly flailed into traffic watching the pretty lights in the sky with their jaws hanging open. The world may have been a better place if we had...
We finally reached the museum almost an hour and a half from when we left the restaurant. It was weird being in the museum so late at night and I was absolutely appalled at the amount of people that were attending the exhibit. Fitz bought our tickets for the 11:15 queue and we wandered around the first floor exhibits for a bit. We queued up at about 11pm with about 200 other people. We all filed into the small exhibit hall that Bodyworlds was housed in on the second floor. I really felt that the hall was too small to accommodate the amount of people viewing the exhibit. The temperature in the rooms was in the mid-eighties and the air was stagnant. I think the environmental systems just couldn't handle the strain.
People were lined up to see each body or display case in the exhibit and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. I suppose it is just the propensity for humans to herd, but with the heat, and the stupid reigning around me I just couldn't stand it any more and I broke free and just walked right up to the first body, ignoring the line. You would have thought I had invented the wheel right before their bovine eyes...
I was impressed by the exhibit itself, the sheer audacity of working with a deceased human form as a media for expression must have been a significant hurdle to overcome for Von Hagens. I felt that in most cases the bodies were displayed with all due reverence. I can see how this method of preserving bodies will soon become valuable for teaching medical personnel. The effect of the display was of course mostly a still life, you could see what happens in the body in motion or at rest. This was an invaluable learning experience for most of the population that has no experience with anatomy courses.
My favourite parts of the exhibit were seeing the artificial implants such as the heart valve and hip replacement display. Seeing the implants in situ was very exciting. I can now picture how they function in a living person and see the harmony in seeing man's creation working in unison with the universes'.
My least favourite parts of the exhibit were all the sheeple. As I get older I become less and less able to stand the mass of irritatingly stupid humanity. When we were looking at a comparison of healthy and smoker's lungs a woman next to me blathered to her companion that it was gross but it wasn't enough to make her give up her precious deathsitcks. However, when she read the display card that explained the health effects of smoking on the lungs and the fact that it shortens ones life span by an average of five years she was SURPRISED. This middle aged woman had somehow missed that SMOKING makes you DEADER QUICKER. I felt like encouraging her habit, hopefully before she managed to breed.
All the portions of exhibit seemed imformative and well done. It was not spooky or grotesque as some people have mentioned. The only portion I found a little macabre was the "Flying Man" I couldn't figure out why splitting his musculature bilaterally showed anything or taught anything different than any of the other views. The grinning skull and jaunty little hat might have something to do with the effect on the viewer.
All in all it was a good exhibit, though I found it draining. It wasn't something to see on a lark, though it was something that should be seen, kind of like the Holocaust museum. We finished viewing the exhibit about 2am.
The whole museum was open during the late hours so to decompress we wandered the rest of the exhibits. I pressed the famed snake button a few times, so I felt better. It was odd, and kind of spooky walking around the museum in the early morning hours, but I would be thrilled if they had it open like that more often. For us late nighters it was an unexpected boon.
It did have its irritating moments though....
I finally snapped when we were in front of the T-Rex eating the Triceratops exhibit. Three teenage girls came running by singing some insipid country song at the top of their shrill little lungs and they stampeded up to the balcony above the main floor jumping and making stupid comments like "HEY ITS A DINOSAUR! HEY MR.DINOSAUR!!!", there was an older gentleman who walked in at about the same time and I just couldn't take it for another second. I turned my face up to the balcony and raised my voice to be heard over the racket. "Hey Guys!" I exclaimed, and watched as three heads poked over the rail. "SHUT UP!", "This is a museum, not a playground, if you want to play, there is a street outside!" When the older gentleman embarrassedly collected them and hussled them away I realized that he was their father or some such. I tried, but upon review, I still don't feel bad about it....