foxtongue: (welcome to the sideshow)
foxtongue ([personal profile] foxtongue) wrote2006-09-15 11:52 am

I want Edward Teach panties, so I can have pirate booty

The BodyWorlds Exhibit opens today at Scienceworld! (His website's been updated, it's nice now. Really).

I went with Alastair to see it when we were down in L.A. It's beautiful and liberating in a way that's difficult to describe. I wanted to cradle every body, kiss thier eyes and know thier names. I stared and I stared, I crept as close as they'll let you to try and memorize every exquisite detail. The exhibition is full of moments of deep, abiding, and very surprising glory, where you find yourself suddenly enraptured with unexpected appreciation for things you'd never think you might see. The volunteer application sheets they have on-line require that all applicants have "Solid comprehension of moral issues regarding death and the displaying of human bodies." I suspect I would fail the test, if there is one. I am brimming with admiration for what Von Hagen has done, I am delighted in respectful awe, but I doubt I have any idea what other people's moral issues might be. Mine are unperturbed, only upset that there are not more of these shows, that it is not at least mandatory for school-children at the age of nine or ten.

Censearchip: exploring search engine result differences returned by different countries' versions of the major search engines. (The Web and image search functions of four national versions of Google and Yahoo!: the United States, China, France, and Germany.)

Summer is over and I'm not sleeping well, though I should be alright. My Oliver-inspired Pirate day is getting posted around as it should be, {it's come around back to me from three different sources today}, and people are saying they'll come. (My man Crow: "I was almost an innocent man!"). Last night I was ship building. Stephen supplied all the construction materials, minus silly string and blue glitter, I made the body of the big one, then Michael came over and made me a mermaid and an anchor, and Ed helped make some brackets for the ropes. Cardboard boats with broomstick masts, it looks like the big one will fit three to five people and the little one will fit two or three. That way we'll have a main ship and an attacker. I plan on simply chucking them off the balcony instead of wrestling them down the stairs when Tuesday comes. Should be fun.

Bush 'Slush Fund' possibly courtesy of the Canadian softwood lumber industry. (hell.)

I brought Sam two baby frogs in a fishbowl and a green mint cupcake for his birthday Monday and we curled up in a chair together and talked. It's comforting to have him back in town, extra special to feel safe and warm while being given small stories from Burning Man. I'm glad he went. He said he didn't miss me because I was everywhere he looked there. Funny how the man keeps me sane, like he's a shadowy mirror of a relationship or a wish I made as a child on the dried out fluff of a dandelion.

[identity profile] jason0x21.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 08:18 pm (UTC)(link)
I am brimming with admiration for what Von Hagen has done, I am delighted in respectful awe, but I doubt I have any idea what other people's moral issues might be.

I am likewise in awe, but there is some dispute over how exactly he gets his corpses. Once I shed my personal carcass, I have little concern over the treatment of it (although one might say it's the most effective of effigies. I'd not want someone doing something to my corpse they'd rather have done to me "personally"), but other folks can be pickier than me, and I think they should be allowed such desires.

After all, I'm sure he could find enough people willing to sign up.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 08:28 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah, see things like "Critics contend that the exhibition is sensationalist and that the artistic, lifelike poses into which the plastinated cadavers have been fixed is degrading and disrespectful." I just don't get. How is that either one?

The only thing I can think of that would give me issue about where the corpses came from is if there was rumour of foul play, if the people hadn't died of natural causes.

[identity profile] kindelingboy.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 09:23 pm (UTC)(link)
Is it just me or does "I had to kill them to make them pretty" make sense?

You know, in a Saw kind of way.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 09:26 pm (UTC)(link)
There's an excellent short story about that here in my room somewhere. In a book, like as not. A man is asked some questions by the police, he remembers that neighbor, sure, but they weren't bodies when he was a boy, they weer rose bushes.

He wonders what his mother saw when he brought home a handful of flowers.

[identity profile] donnaidh-sidhe.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 11:05 pm (UTC)(link)
It's only degrading and disrespectful if the cadavers were obtained, as you said, through foul play, or against the last wishes of the deceased. Actually, if you pose the remains in obscene ways, that would probably fit the bill, as well.

Now I'm thinking ten will get you twenty that the "degrading and disrespectful" comment was inspired by the fetuses.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:35 am (UTC)(link)
I think there's the same sort of line between sexual and obscene aas there is between porn and eroticism. I don't mind plastinate corpses kissing or locked together with cut-aways to show where everything goes. I think that's beautiful.

[identity profile] skonen-blades.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 04:35 am (UTC)(link)
As far as I know, he has enough corpses to last him a hell of a long time. Everyone is eager to donate their bodies to him. I saw the show in London. I found the fetuses fascinating. It's a beautiful exhibit.

However, one of the exhibits I saw in London that gave me pause was a Harry Potter corpse. His instestines had been stretched out and hardened into a 'broom' and his skin had been flayed and was flying out behind him like a corpse. He was wearing giant round novelty eyeglasses for that student look.

I would be mortified (see what I did there?) if my body was turned into a novelty corpse instead of the scientific exhibit I was expecting. Not that it would be possible for me to feel anything one way or the other but you know what I'm saying. I'm totally down with the graphic nature of the show but I have a problem when they target a child audience by using actual cadavers to represent characters from children's books or when they try to add a little lighthearted comedy to what should be a sombre and dignified experience.

But I do believe it's lovely. I'm looking forward to seeing it. I haven't seen it in two years. I wonder what has changed.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 05:04 am (UTC)(link)
I didn't see a Harry Potter corpse, there was nothing like that at all at the one I went to. I believe there's something like three or four shows traveling to globe, however, so it's easy to think we went to different exhibits. I think a Harry potter corpse bothers me too, it feels like pandering, whereas the mad man, one I saw that was made of all sorts of whirling dervish peices, was exquisite and captured me for almost a full twenty minutes because there was no question that it was art.

[identity profile] skonen-blades.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 05:23 am (UTC)(link)
Yeah the Harry Potter was probably London specific. And his flayed skin was flying out behind him like a cape, not a corpse. Oops.
I also liked exhibit with the plastified veins standing by themselves. That was fascinating. And so many others. I'm looking forward to seeing it again.

Pirate day is getting posted around as it should be

[identity profile] reluctance.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 10:17 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't know about all that, but here's another one.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-15 10:25 pm (UTC)(link)
That's the one I've got linked on the word "around" though thank you, I appreciate it. I've heard of a couple more, mostly Andrew's doing.

[identity profile] skonen-blades.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 04:44 am (UTC)(link)
Boy that contact juggling that Chris did there in the video was mind blowing. I keep watching it. It's hypnotic. Awesome.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 05:02 am (UTC)(link)
I've known Chris since the first week he was in Vancouver, but the effect never wears off. He makes me understand why religious people think sex is dirty.

[identity profile] uminthecoil.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 06:18 am (UTC)(link)
wow...speechless...thanks for both the video and the music...it's beautiful when people can actually express that kind of wizardry

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:38 am (UTC)(link)
*grins* I hope that video gets passed around, though it's the only time I've ever seen him drop anything, (he had the flu), just because I think it's important people see what humans are capable of.

[identity profile] sciencequeen.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 06:57 am (UTC)(link)
I believe me and some of my friends are going Sep 30 sometime. Would you like to come along with us?

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:38 am (UTC)(link)
Hells yeah. I'll want to see it lots.

[identity profile] plaidalicious.livejournal.com 2006-09-16 03:56 pm (UTC)(link)
beautiful juggling, and I really want to see that exhibit. Possibly I shall join any excursion that happens.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:38 am (UTC)(link)
Sincerely, you simply must.

[identity profile] radiodog.livejournal.com 2006-09-17 06:00 am (UTC)(link)
I can pretty much gurranteee there will be RUM GELATO for tuesday.

Gelato Time, just down from the park.

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:39 am (UTC)(link)
I still dont' have a tri-corn hat. Stephen's planning on newspaper hats and I think I might follow his lead.

Hey, want to come finish the ships on Monday?

[identity profile] radiodog.livejournal.com 2006-09-17 06:03 am (UTC)(link)
I just realized, that image you have my name hyperlinked too... i think that's almost the exact moment I became a not goth.

Oh, and any plans for an expedition to BodyWorlds?

[identity profile] porphyre.livejournal.com 2006-09-18 12:39 am (UTC)(link)
They're in the tube.