Friday, November 18, 2005

Beauty Is Not Skin Deep (But Ethics May Be)

Filed under: Art

Reuters is reporting a new anatomy exhibit making its way to New York City:

On November 19, 22 whole bodies and more than 260 organs will go on display in lower Manhattan's South Street Seaport, allowing visitors to see bodies damaged by obesity, black lungs ravaged by cigarette smoke, and close-ups of the central nervous, digestive and circulatory systems...

The cadavers were poor people and are on loan from the Dalian Medical University in China. They are preserved through a technique called polymer preservation, which uses liquid silicone rubber that is treated and hardened. The process can take more than a year, and makes the bodies impervious to decomposition.

Just in time for Thanksgiving. It sounds a lot like the Body Worlds tour we caught in London a few years back (indeed, the Body Worlds founder has a relationship with Dalian University, and prosecutes copycats).

At the exhibit's last stop in Tampa, there was controversy over how the Chinese procured these cadavers -- the body identities, to say nothing of written consent, is often unknown.

Video is available...

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