Apr
23
Body Worlds 3
Filed Under Exhibits | Leave a Comment
Plastination is the process of swapping out your precious bodily fluids with plastic and basically transforming you into a giant, fully-poseable action figure — one without skin or even a spring-loaded missile launcher. Your skinless, sinewy plasticized body is then carved up, cross-sectioned and put on display in an exhibition called Body Worlds 3. That Plastination — the brainchild of Dr. Gunther von Hagens — has not been performed in a “Saw” movie yet really goes to show how behind the times Hollywood is. For now, horror fans can enjoy Plastinates at the California Science Center, like I did this afternoon.
But Body Worlds isn’t just a life-size menagerie of macabre. Artistically, one could make a strong case for the marriage of hard plastic and human tissue as a commentary on the direction in which our Botoxed, Lipozapped, Silicone-implanted culture is heading — the complete and total plasticization of ourselves. This is a science exhibit, though, not an art exhibit. Seeing how the human body is a super-sophisticated machine is pretty amazing. And you get the feeling that maybe you don’t work out enough; all these dead folks are built like Adonises.
I gravitated towards the plastinated lungs with emphysema and ulcerated stomachs and cross-sections of morbidly obese people — all the icky stuff. I also learned that the human body can survive without a spleen, but you can actually die of a broken heart. That being said, the most important lesson I learned from Body Worlds 3 today is this: store all your emotions in your spleen.
-Brad Lohan