Category Archives: Anatomy

I would like to cordially invite all Morbid Anatomy readers to join us in bidding farewell to the sadly ephemeral Great Coney Island Spectacularium and Cosmorama of the great Dreamland Fire. The exhibition--more on which here--will end after Labor Day weekend, so this is one of your last chances to see it. So please, come raise a glass with us, surrounded by the unfortunate taxidermy once on view at one of the oldest dime museums in the Americas, the Niagara Falls Museum. Join us for a beer in the soon to be dismantled and utterly transporting Cosmorama of the great Dreamland Fire! Help us kiss the lovely toy theater proscenium farewell!

The party will take place next Saturday, August 25th at The Coney Island Museum; There will be free beer and wine, including a special Dreamland Fire Brew, hand-crafted by our friends at the Coney Island Brewery and wine by Red Hook Winery. Artists will be in attendance, as will special guest performers. AND rogue musician Nick Yulman will perform original scores using mechanical instruments for two 1926 films, Now You Tell One and A Wild Roomer by silent comedian and stop-motion animation innovator Charlie Bowers.

The event begins at 8:00 PM; the film will begin at 8:30pm. $20 in advance or at the door. Advance Tickets here. Hope very much to see you there!

You can find out more by clicking here.

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In an interesting 15th century precursor to spectacular displays of human bodies such as Gunther von Hagen's Body Worlds:

Ferdinand I [of Naples (1423 – 1494)], Alfonso II's long-reigning father, had filled an exhibition hall of Castel Nuovo with the mummified remains of his enemies. Paolo Giovio, the sixteenth-century bishop, doctor, and biographer, writes in Historiarum sue temporis: "They say that these dried cadavers were displayed, pickled with herbs, a frightful sight, in the dress they wore when alive and with the same ornaments, so that by this terrible example of tyranny, those who did not wish to be similarly served might be properly afraid."

Just one of the fascinating revelations in the wonderful book Naples Declared: A Walk Around the Bay, by Benjamin Taylor. Another writer--Jacob Burckhardt, in his The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy of 1878 --described it thusly:

Besides hunting, which he practiced regardless of all rights of property, his pleasures were of two kinds: he liked to have his opponents near him, either alive in well-guarded prisons, or dead and embalmed, dressed in the costume which they wore in their lifetime. Fearing no one, he would take great pleasure in conducting his guests on a tour of his prized “museum of mummies.”

And wow; looks like this made an appearance on The Borgias as well; I guess I had better consider giving that show another chance.

Image source: Wikipedia

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Wax model of a decomposing body in a walnut coffin, Italy, 1774-1800

The body in this wooden coffin is in a severe state of decomposition. It may have had two purposes: as ‘memento mori’, a reminder of death, or as a teaching aid. The figure is surrounded by three frogs. Frogs are symbols of rebirth and regeneration because they change so much in their lifetimes. Wax modelling was used in Europe to create religious effigies. From the 1600s, they were also used to teach anatomy. The creation of wax anatomical models, centred in Italy, was based on observing real corpses. The museum known as La Specola, or ‘the observatory’, in Florence was famous for its wax collection.

Found in the always delightful Macabre and Beautifully Grotesque Facebook Group.

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The new morbid curiosity... may be a pendulum swing back toward the sublime and the philosophical—a new secular foray into the morbid territory that religion previously charted. One way to avoid deeper engagement with death is to paint it entirely from the crude palette of emotions like disgust and fear. We've already got plenty of that kind of "morbid" in popular culture. But awe and wonder need to be restored to our experience of death, and we're not sure how to do it in a post-religious culture.

--"A Healthy Mania for the Macabre," Stephen T. Asma, The Chronicle for Higher Education

The above is excerpted from a characteristically thoughtful and erudite piece by Stephen Asma, one of my all-time favorite scholars and author of the fantastic Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads. The piece--entitled "A Healthy Mania for the Macabre"--explores the current uptick of interest in all things macabre, and situates it within the history ofspectacular morbid display from memento mori to Frederik Ruysch to Gunther von Hagens; It also features interesting quotations from interviews with morbid art collector Richard Harris, charnel house obsessive and Empire of Death author Paul Koudounaris, and yours truly.

You can read the entire article by clicking here. I very highly recommend it!

Image: Clemente Susini (probably): Slashed Beauty, wax, human hair, pearls, rosewood and Venetian glass case, ca 1790, La Specola, Museo di Storia Naturale, Florence, Italy; From the Anatomical Theatre exhibition

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Tamie in St. Louis: I can't take not knowing if they are killing Eric Dane off Grey's! Any idea what the plan is? Well, we're not going to sugarcoat it, but when we spoke to Chandra Wilson, it didn't sound good. Mostly because she was talking about taking care of him and "stroking" him (we assume his face) in the beginning of the season. "I really appreciate the way that we have taken care of him in the beginning of the season," Wilson tells us. "I think it's something that Grey's fans will really appreciate. We get to stroke him a lot in the beginning of our season." However, she assured us that someone who is gone from the show will not be forgotten. "It doesn't matter if the characters aren't there anymore. We just talk about him all the time!" she laughs. Let's hope they aren't using past tense when talking about McSteamy.

Ben in Chicago: I've been missing your Smash coverage! Cannot wait until it returns, so can I have a bit of scoop for now to hold me over until 2013? Doesn't the second season of Smash seem so far away? It's unbearableuntil we wiggled our way onto the set and got some awesome scoop! More on that later, but for now, here are some tidbits we can reveal: a mosh pit, an unexpected relationship between Jennifer Hudson's character and Ivy, Tom large and in charge and finallyKaren is in looove!

Check out an extremely sexy (and leggy!) Kate Hudson on Glee

Beth: I'm so bummed that Tim Daly won't be back on Private Practice. Will his exit be addressed on the show? We're sad to see him go, too, and yes, his absence will definitely be felt on the show, especially by Violet. "My character at the beginning of the season, it's all about loss," Amy Brenneman tells us. "Tim is not coming back, and that's pretty much what I'm dealing with." As for Daly's exit, Brenneman says, "It's like life. People come, and then they go, and then [they] write to it. It gets to be like real living."

Cece: I'm so sick of the Liam-Silver-Navid love triangle on 90210! Is there any hope for us Liam and Annie fans? There's always hope! At least, that's what Matt Lanter says of the fan-favorite couple's future. "I didn't know there were so many Liam and Annie fans! Every time Liam tries to get together with some other girl, all I hear about is Liam and Annie on my Twitter and stuff," he says. "I think there is always hope for it. We'll see how long the series runs. Maybe they'll get back together in the end of the series. We got to wait for it!" We advise against holding your breath, people, it may be a while!

Continued here:
Spoiler Chat: Scoop on Grey's Anatomy, Smash, Teen Wolf, Private Practice and More!