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New MOSI Exhibit Uses Real Bodies To Explain The Heart

Gunther von Hagens, Institute for Plastination, Heidelberg, Germany, www.bodyworlds.com

An exhibit of real human bodies is coming to Tampa's Museum of Science & Industry.

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By KEITH MORELLI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 21, 2009

Updated: 01/21/2009 12:59 pm

TAMPA - The new exhibit at the Museum of Science & Industry folds science into art, icky into beautiful.

"Body Worlds & The Story of the Heart" opens tomorrow to what museum officials hope will be crowds similar to "Bodies, The Exhibition," a different showing that was at the museum from August 2005 to August 2006. That show drew half-a-million people.

This exhibit is not connected, although to the lay attendee, the differences surely will be subtle.

"This is the original inventor and designer" of the process of plastination, said Wit Ostrenko, president and CEO of MOSI. Plastination is the name of the patented process which preserves and encases body tissue.

"This exhibit is much more refined," he said this morning. "It's a more intricate display and tells the story of the heart. The cardiovascular system is not easy to understand. This is an artistic reflection of ourselves."

The exhibit opens Thursday morning at the museum, located on East Fowler Avenue across from the University of South Florida.

Both exhibits have commonality: They show real organs and bodies that have been encased and preserved in plastic.

Organs are in display cases and bodies are posed in various life-like positions. A gymnast bends over backwards on a balance beam, a runner leaps over a hurdle; an Olympian rears back to fling a javelin.

Each display shows how muscles work during the exercises.

Angelina Whalley, who heads the Institute for Plastination in Germany, said when she and her husband, Gunther von Hagens, first put the displays on exhibit in Japan some 15 years ago, they weren't in such striking poses and the feedback was that museum goers were frightened. "The specimens looked so dead," she said.

Over the years, the bodies began to be more lifelike, she said, striking poses they may have taken in life.

All that takes time, she said. A single body on display involves about 1,500 hours of work over a year's time. The results are fascinating poses, stunningly lit to show the tiniest detail.

"I and my husband … wanted to show the intricate and beautiful design of the human body," she said. "We take the utmost care to make the specimens look as beautiful as they can."

She said the exhibit melds science and art.

"We have pulled anatomy from the ivory towers of the universities," she said, "and brought it to the people."

Body Worlds has been exhibiting bodies and body parts in the United States for about three years. The MOSI engagement is the first time the exhibit, which includes 22 full body specimens and 200 displays, is being shown in Florida.

All of the displays are people who specifically donated their bodies to von Hagens' institute. Nearly 9.000 donors have registered, Body Worlds officials say.

The theme of this exhibit is the heart and how it sustains life. The first display attendees will see is in a darkened walkway. A heart, bright red, sits in a display case. Above it, a spotlight dims and brightens giving the illusion that the heart is beating.

Around the corner is a full skeleton on its knees, praying. Between its open hands, lifted above its head is a cluster of striking bright red heart vessels. The display is a memorial to body donors.

The exhibit, which runs until through June, has been seen by about 26 million people in 47 cities in Asia, Europe and North America.

Advance tickets for the MOSI exhibit are on sale and can be purchased at www.mosi.org. Tickets are $25.95, $19.95 for ages 12 and younger and $22.95 for ages 60 and older. Museum members are eligible for reduced ticket prices.

The exhibit opens Thursday and runs through June.

Hours are 9 a.m. to until 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 259-7760.

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