Florida's giant squid

On July 3rd, Robert Benz, Joey Asaro, and Paul Peroulakis went fishing off the coast of Florida. Little did they know what they would find about 12 miles offshore. "We looked at it [and] all 3 of us were like, 'Holy mackerel!' It didn't seem it had been dead long, the tentacles were still moving..." recounted Benz (watch news video here). It was a giant squid longer than their 23' boat. The men managed to get the 200lb creature on board and quickly brought it in to the commercial docks. The squid was put it on ice and the authorities were notified. At a field office of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the animal was necropsied. It was then released to scientists at the University of Florida's Museum of Natural History. Invertebrate paleontologist Roger Portell (1st image) declared the 8-armed (3rd image, close-up) specimen to be exceptional, missing only a single tentacle and minus any other trauma, and a rare find. Giant squid usually live in water 300' to 1,000' deep, and this one was found floating on the surface of the ocean at a depth of 170' and much further south than their usual habitat. They injected it with formalin and are now soaking it in a bath of 10% of the preservative solution. As part of their research collection, the squid has drawn the attention of biologists who intend to analyze its genetic make-up. Depending on how successfully they are able to preserve it, the UFL curators hope to put the giant beast on public display. “It looks nice, it’s still in fabulous shape and it’s big. It would be really cool to exhibit something like this, if it turns out that it preserves well enough and we can find a way to exhibit it so that it doesn’t damage the specimen," says John Slapinsky, malacology collections manager. Perhaps the best way to preserve it - which would not be precluded by the formalin already used - would be to plastinate it (slideshow here), as was done at the Paris Natural History Museum.

Zsa Zsa

The husband of Hungarian actress Zsa Zsa Gabor (b. 1917) has been criticized recently for staging publicity stunts as the aging star (pictured in her prime and last year) fights for her life. German socialite Frédéric Prinz von Anhalt (b. 1943), whom she married in 1986, has most recently revealed that he wants the 94-year-old to become a mother again! Back in September, he told a German newspaper that he wants to have his wife's body plastinated by Gunther von Hagens when she dies and then put her on show. He says, "My wife has always dreamt that her beauty would be immortal. I would like to show the plastinated body of Zsa Zsa Gabor in the context of a scene in one of her films." Having studied the plastinates in graduate school, I can shed some light on that:

1. Gunther von Hagens intends his plastinates to be anatomical entities, hence they are displayed without skin to reveal their underlying organs, vessels, and musculature. He follows aesthetic principles to render them visually pleasing so that we are not put off by the confrontation with our own corporeality and mortality. This would make Gabor's body, now missing a limb, ineligible. As he explains, "The aesthetic pose, which is occasionaly criticized, is what helps dispel revulsion; because it is so powerful, it also promotes emotional awareness.”
2. To achieve his goal of using an individual body to represent a universal anatomy, von Hagens strips plastinates of their individual identities (even though he reinvests them with a generic postmortem identity, such as a swimmer or a dancer). In his own words, "Anonymity neutralizes the individual, emotional bonds to the deceased and underscores the change in meaning of a corpse from an object of mourning to one of study."
3. For these reasons, I believe von Hagens would find it inappropriate to plastinate the body of a known celebrity. Besides which, although he gratefully accepts body donations, he does not - as far as I know - take on commissions.

Anatomists, 18th c. and 21st c.

“No preparation, even executed with the greatest care, holds to me any value if it does not demonstrate a new fact or the resolution of a debated issue. All their preparations, collected in the cabinet, satisfy only the gaze; few among them serve to demonstrate any new truths, to refute old errors; the refinements throughout are not instructive and demonstrate only the handiwork of their creator.”

This quote reads like it is a criticism of Gunther von Hagens' plastinates, but it was actually a remark made in 1779 by German doctor Georg Ludwig Rumpelt upon seeing the preparations of French anatomist Honoré Fragonard (1732-1799). Roughly 200 years after Fragonard's death, von Hagens paid his predecessor homage by replicating his most famous écorché, "Horse and Rider," using his plastination method to arrive at an even more vivid "Man on Horseback."

Fragonard created many of his masterpieces at a veterinary school outside Paris. The Fragonard Museum at École nationale vétérinaire d'Alfort is where many of his creations are still curated, including hundreds of animal skeletons and specimens (1st image). Fragonard preserved human cadavers to demonstrate comparative anatomy to the veterinary students, who may well have been more interested in his preparations "The Llama"(3rd image), "The Monkey Holding a Nut" (5th image), and "The Bust of a Sheep with Four Horns" (7th image). He was dismissed from his post for being considered a madman.

Gunther von Hagens has made a name for himself presenting anatomized humans to the public, but starting just this month offers an under-the-skin (and the fur and the feathers) look exclusively at animals to visitors at the Cologne Zoo (video here). The exhibits include a horse's head (2nd image), a camel family (4th image), a gorilla (6th image, with von Hagens), and a series of horned animals (8th image). He, too, is considered by some to be quite mad!

There is plenty written about Gunther von Hagens on the web, but if you - like me - have been starved for details about his 18th c. counterpart, you will be thrilled to know that a new book - Fragonard Museum: The Écorchés, The Anatomical Masterworks of Honoré Fragonard - has just been published! There was no guidebook available when I visited the Fragonard Museum in 1999, but my craving for images (including Fragonard's specimens above), biographical information, and embalming "recipes" has now been duly satisfied.

Dalian

I recently declined an invitation to deliver a speech at the 1st Annual World Congress of Forensics that is to be held in October in Dalian, China. That is also the location where Gunther von Hagens prepares the plastinates for his BodyWorlds exhibitions, which have now been seen by 30 million people worldwide. As you may know, plastination involves dissecting a body to expose chosen anatomical features (3rd image), submerging it in a bath to replace the liquids with a polymer, posing it in the desired posture (2nd image), and gas-curing it under a plastic tent (3rd image). The private company that he founded in 2001 - von Hagens Dalian Plastination Ltd. - currently employs a staff of 250. Some of them are shown preparing individual organs (1st image) and Dr. von Hagens may be seen anatomizing a body (video here in German - caution) prior to plastinating, and displaying it.

Here's what I could find out about von Hagens' Dalian facility that the New York Times says "can only be described as a modern mummification factory." The sprawling campus is fenced and well-guarded. The buildings are unmarked and include a warehouse with stainless steel tanks containing animal and human corpses. There are several workshops in which medical school graduates prepare the bodies at an average salary of $200 to $400 a month. In some of these, the staff sits in assembly-line formation. In others, teams painstakingly dissect skinless corpses as they lay stretched out on tables. In the positioning room, dozens of workers place the body in what will be its final form and equip it with the props it needs to depict its designated activity. The large and sunny room is populated with plastinates in various states of readiness. With whole-body plastinates requiring a preparation time of 1,500 hours each, the staff is able to produce 30 per year. In spite of the efficiency, von Hagens assures, “Every specimen is an anatomical treasure.”

Honoré Fragonard

While his better-known cousin was painting pretty pictures, Honoré Fragonard (1732-1799) was busy flaying corpses. He prepared thousands of ecorches, 21 of which are still extant and on display at the Musée Fragonard d'Alfort. His most dramatic preparation, "Horseman of the Apocalypse" (above, top), has been replicated by contemporary anatomist Gunther von Hagens, who simply calls it "Horse and Rider" (above, bottom). The plastination process of the full-color preparation took three years and the specimen can be seen in BodyWorlds. I was able to compare the two, having seen Fragonard's embalmments outside Paris in 1999 and von Hagens' plastinates in Chicago in 2005. They each have their charms!

Public dissection

Dissection was an event open to the public in the 19th century and the corpse came from the gallows, the criminal having been sentenced to be “hanged and publicly dissected.” It was punishment and it was entertainment. It has been part of the education of doctors, who got front row seats at the anatomy theatre back then. Today's dissections have only a medical (or medico-legal) audience, but anatomist Gunther von Hagens has challenged the notion of whether doctors should have a privileged view. During my graduate studies, I focused on the [dead] body, specifically its preservation by plastination and its comparison to a book, which is to be opened and read. I plan to use this background to research and write a book that lays out the history and sorts out our ambivalent feelings about viewing dissection. I found out today that my publisher, McFarland & Co., is willing to publish such a book! And, as you see, it has such illustrative potential...