The Call of Abandoned Souls: Guest Post and New Book by Ivan Cenzi of Bizzarro Bazar

Following is a guest post by Ivan Cenzi of the Bizzarro Bazar blog, who has just published a new, heavily illustrated book on the astounding Fontanelle Cemetery in Naples, which some readers might remember from this recent Morbid Anatomy post. You can find out more about the book--and order a copy of your own--here.You can also visit in the Morbid Anatomy Library where you will find a copy on our Death and Culture shelf!

THE CALL OF ABANDONED SOULS
The strange, unorthodox cult which developed in the Fontanelle Cemetery in Naples
by Ivan Cenzi, Bizzarro Bazar

The Fontanelle Cemetery in Naples is not just exceptional in its location (the remains of 40.000 human beings are stacked inside an ancient tuff quarry), but mainly because in this evocative underground cathedral a popular cult has developed over the ages: it's the cult of abandoned souls (anime pezzentelle). Anonymous souls, poor and deprived of the prayers and comfort of their loved ones, souls in need of the compassion of the living to alleviate their suffering. 

There is an undoubted elective affinity between the suffering souls in Purgatory and they who struggle and suffer in this world. There has never been any doubt in the minds of the Neapolitans about the truth of suffering on Earth, where hope is weak, work is inevitable fatigue, and the hell of Vesuvius ready to explode at any moment makes every breath uncertain. Naples is in some senses a purgatorial city in itself. An afterlife where suffering continues is inevitably a familiar concept. 

So the Neapolitans found in this poverty – the dead leave behind all material goods, and are left forgotten in suffering, while the living are always in need of assistance and help – the trait d'union between this world and the next. The skulls piled in the great cavern became a bridge between the tribulations of both sides, a symbolic representation of all the “nameless souls” waiting for redemption. 

According to tradition, a person would choose a skull to adopt, dedicate his prayers to and light candles for. Sometimes on the other hand it was the departed who “called” and chose his supporter, appearing in dreams to show himself: he would then tell the story of his life, frequently a tragic tale, and ask for offerings and prayers on his behalf. Once the identity of the soul in question had been revealed, the skull was cleaned and polished, placed on a piece of cloth with a rosary around it, and surrounded with flowers and candles. All communication occurred through dreams: in this way the soul of the deceased could keep his champion informed on his state of “relief”, the effectiveness of the offerings, and about the advancement of any requests for favor. This last frequently concerned for example an ailing child, a daughter who could not find a husband, or a husband away at war, in other cases it became a request for lottery numbers – in the eternal hope that luck and fate would alleviate financial problems. 

Whenever piety shown by the faithful was rewarded by an answer to their prayers, the decorations would become more ornate, The piece of cloth was replaced with an embroidered cushion with lace, and the skull would be put in a glass display case or, where this couldn't be afforded, in a tin box. The more “generous” skulls ended up being adopted as protective spirits by the whole community; if on the other hand no prayers were answered, the cranium would be returned to the stack and another chosen, and the whole process started over again. 

This worship of anonymous remains was clearly not contemplated by the Church, which only allows veneration of recognized, Vatican-approved relics of saints. Even the votive displays, when observed more carefully, look like a proletarian version of the sacred reliquaries kept in the Cathedral or in numerous other Neapolitan churches: the fideistic practice instituted de facto a range of unorthodox “saints”, not authorized by the Church and whose relics became object of the worship of common people. 

These original popular “saints” are the real Superstars in the cemetery – skulls so generous in their favours that they have, over time, become real icons of the cemetery, taking on the role of folklore characters around which various legends have sprung up. There's Donna Concetta, the “sweating head”, a revered skull that has the quality of attracting more humidity than any of the others. When little drops of water appear on its shiny forehead, the skull is ready to fulfill any requests. There is the skull of Pascale, who helps you win the lottery; 'o nennillo who brings happiness to the family; and the most famous of all, “the Captain”, around which several legends revolve, and who makes sure respectful girls find a good husband. 

It might seem surprising that such a practice was tolerated, however marginalized, for so long by the Catholic Church until the cult was definitively ostracised in 1969. Today, you can still see some old woman lighting up a candle before a specific skull, but the cult has almost entirely died out. And, as it so often happens in Italy despite our great cultural heritage, the Fontanelle cemetery is now sadly left to crumble. If you travel to Italy and find yourself in Naples, you might want to plan a visit before it's gone for good. Its enchanted underground location and sober arrangement of bones (not at all macabre, as in some other baroque italian charnel houses) make for a peaceful and meaningful break from traffic and confusion, as you enter a place where the barrier between the living and the dead was once trespassed.

Ivan Cenzi and Carlo Vannini's“De Profundis, second volume in the Bizzarro Bazar Collection, is dedicated to the Fontanelle Cemetery, and is available on Libri.it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ivan Cenzi is an explorer of the uncanny and collector of curiosities. Since 2009 he has been curator of Bizzarro Bazar, a blog dedicated to everything that is strange, macabre and wonderful.

ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPHER
Carlo Vannini is the photographer of all “cultural” objects: artworks, archaeological finds, restoration works, architectural structures, city views, but also ordinary handcrafted artefacts permeated by a strong historical feeling. Website www.carlovannini.it

Call for Papers: Art, Anatomy, and Medicine Since 1700, Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, South Carolina, March 31-April 1, 2016. Deadline: July 15

This call for papers just in for an exciting looking conference on Art, Anatomy and Medicine to take place at Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia, South Carolina in April, 2016!

Full call follows; deadline is July 15. Good luck, and hope to see you there!

Call for Papers: Art, Anatomy, and Medicine since 1700

DEADLINE approaching (but extended to July 15)! Travel and lodging funds available for speakers!! 

A two-day symposium sponsored by the University of South Carolina’s Provost’s Office and the School of Visual Art, in partnership with the Columbia Museum of Art To be held @ the Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, South Carolina, March 31-April 1, 2016

The symposium organizer seeks proposals for papers that address visual, theoretical, cultural, historical and/or contemporary connections, relationships, conflicts and/or collaborations among the visual arts, anatomy/dissection, and medicine from the eighteenth century to the present. Participants may be historians of art, medicine, science or technology, art educators, medical professionals, artists (who may propose to contextualize their own work), etc. Successful papers may also be invited for publication in an edited volume of the same theme. 

Broad topics may include (but are certainly not limited to):

• The role of anatomy in artists’ training (past, present and/or future)

• Artists’ roles in the creation/dissemination of anatomical knowledge

• Artistic representation of anatomical and medical professionals

• Anatomical and medical models: from écorché figures to nano-imagery

• Anatomy as art, art as anatomy

• Anatomical displays, exhibitions (e.g. Body Worlds), and collections: from curious to educational to controversial

• Corpses, dissection and grave-robbing in art, literature and medical history

• Imaging bodily surface and anatomical depth: from sculpture to M.R.I.s and beyond

• Beyond human, superhuman, inhuman(e)?: technological ‘improvements’, additions and extensions of human anatomy from prosthetics/implants to Google glasses

• Zombies and vampires, and the creative/fantastic defiance of or resistance to anatomical, medical and worldly reality

• The evolutionary human in art and science: looking backward and looking ahead 

• Parts vs. whole: the functions of specificity and generality in aesthetics and visual medical information 

Please send cover letter, abstract (no more than 3 pages, double-spaced typed), and CV to Dr. Andrew Graciano, Associate Professor of Art History and Associate Director, School of Visual Art and Design via email: graciano [at] mailbox.sc.edu.

Image: De dissectione partium corporis humani...Charles Estienne, anatomist; Paris, 1545. Woodcut. National Library of Medicine. As seen in Dream Anatomy, curated by Michael Sappol

Desperately Seeking a Copy of "Model Experts: Wax Anatomies and Enlightenment in Florence and Vienna, 1775-1815" by Anna Maerker

My copy of Model Experts: Wax Anatomies and Enlightenment in Florence and Vienna, 1775-1815 by Anna Maerker has gone missing from the @Morbid Anatomy Library. If anyone has a copy I could borrow for a few weeks, I would be most grateful! You can send an email to joanna [at] morbidanatomymuseum.org! Thanks!

Image: Anatomical Venus, Il Museo di Storia Naturale website

TONIGHT: Greenwood Event Rain Cancellation and Morbid Anatomy Seeks Retail/Visitor Service Associate

Due to the threat of thunderstorms, tonight's event at Greenwood Cemetery, Common Shade: Catherine Gallant on Isadora Duncan’s Dances of Mourning, has been rescheduled and will now take place next Tuesday, June 23 at 7:30 PM. Our sincere apologies for any inconvenience!

Also: Morbid Anatomy is now seeking a new part time Retail/Visitor Services Associate. The job begins in early July and will be approximately 20 hours a week (Sundays, Mondays and Fridays) at $10 an hour.

If you are interested, please send a resume and a brief paragraph describing your interest to erica [at] morbidanatomymuseum.org with "Retail Associate Application" in subject line. Responsibilities and qualifications follow.

Responsibilities

•     Welcoming visitors to the museum
•     Ringing up sales and museum admissions
•     Tidying the space
•     Answering the phone
•     Side projects as directed by the office manager
•     Sales
•     Answering visitor questions
•     Customer Service
•     Opening and closing the museum and store

Qualifications

•     Retail experience
•     Neat and tidy in work space
•     Friendly and outgoing
•     Interested in the Morbid Anatomy Museum

Corpse Theatre in the Sacred Spaces of Italy: Guest Post by Elizabeth Harper, All The Saints You Should Know Blog

Elizabeth Harper of the fabulous All the Saints You Should Know blog has some astounding details to add to the material covered in our recent post on Sacred Italian Waxworks or The Last Judgement with Real Corpses in 18th and 19th Century Italy. She kindly agreed to write the following guest post which expands on the idea in surprising ways.

All image credits listed below. Please click on images to see larger, more detailed version!

Corpse Theatre, by Elizabeth Harper

There’s a building that’s hard to overlook on via Giulia in Rome. It’s the one with laughing skulls over the door. 

On a marble plaque at eye level, a winged skeleton holds a spent hourglass over a fresh cadaver. The plaque reads “Alms to the poor dead, which they get in the countryside.”

  “They” is La Confraternita dell'Orazione e Morte, or the Confraternity of Prayer and Death. They were a group of Catholic laymen who buried Rome’s indigent dead and this building was their oratory.

Burying the dead is a particularly important Catholic ritual because burial is linked to the concept of purgatory. Purgatory is a place where heaven-bound souls undergo a final purification before entering heaven, but in Catholic imagery it can easily be mistaken for hell. Fire surrounds writhing nude bodies. This fire is supposed to cleanse the souls just like the grave eventually cleanses bones of rotting flesh. Appropriate, since sin and flesh are often inextricable, like in St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians where he calls everything from drunkenness to sorcery a “sin of the flesh”. After purgatory, when sin and flesh are gone for good, the clean, white bones are considered at peace and safely in heaven, which is why skeletons like the one on the façade are often shown with wings. But conversely, no burial means no peace. Though it’s not entirely orthodox, folk traditions imply that the dead can find themselves stuck in a netherworld between this world and the afterlife if they’re not given a Catholic burial.

Migrant workers in the farms outside of Rome were particularly susceptible to this fate. Malaria could kill them in the midst of their work and without family or friends to tend to them, weather and animals could ravage their corpse. The brothers in the Confraternity of Prayer and Death made the trip out to the countryside by foot and gathered these bodies year-round. It could take them four days to carry the dead back to Rome on their stretcher. They did this from 1552 to 1896. Their handwritten ledgers indicate that they picked up at least 8,600 bodies during those 344 years. If they passed a parish churchyard they would bury the workers there, but if not, they would carry them back to their oratory on via Giulia.

Today, the nuns who use the oratory open it for just a few hours every week while they pray for souls in purgatory. If you happen to find the church open, a donation to the sisters yields access to the crypt where you can see the lifetimes of work done by the brothers before them. Down there, you’re likely to be alone. The erratic hours mean that unlike Rome’s famous Capuchin crypt, there’s no line of nervously giggling tourists. It’s just you, the bone chandeliers, the engraved skulls, an altar full of legs and arms, and somewhat ominously, a scythe.

The overall effect is a bit ramshackle because we’re only seeing salvaged pieces of the original crypt. When the Tiber embankments were added in the late 19th century, the majority of the crypt and the order’s cemetery were destroyed. Including, unfortunately, the crypt’s theatre.

The scythe is actually nothing more than a theatrical prop, but somehow that’s even more unnerving than the real thing.

Here are a few images of how it once looked:
  In 1763 the confraternity built a stage in their crypt. They started using the corpses they collected in tableaux staged for the public called sacred representations. If you’ve ever seen one of those Christmas manger scenes where a real Baby Jesus is depicted more or less in a petting zoo, you’ve seen a sacred representation. The only difference was the confraternity was using dead people, not farm animals. 

They staged a sacred representation every year for the week following All Souls Day. It started simply with “The Burial of Jacob”. A few flat paintings were used as scenery and a corpse played Jacob’s corpse. Specific death scenes were always popular, The death of Judith, Jezebel, and St. Paul were all staged along with a few more universal tableaux, like “the allegory that we all must die”.

Every year the productions became more elaborate. By 1790 they had life-sized wax figures playing the roles of the living, dressed in costumes designed for the occasion.  In 1802 when they staged “The Mountain of Purgatory” they built a mountain surrounded by candelabra. The figure of Justice was perched up high holding scales and a sword. Beneath him you could see souls in the flames of purgatory. One lucky soul was shown being lifted by a cherub and taken up to heaven. When staged with actual dead people, it’s hard to make a scene like this any more literal. The sacred representations were seen as a useful teaching tool that transcended language and literacy barriers.

Other churches in Rome like Santa Maria in Trastevere and the now deconsecrated cemetery chapel of the Lateran put on similar, though less elaborate tableaux. But another place that rivaled the Baroque stagecraft of Santa Maria dell'Orazione e Morte was the hospital just across the Tiber—Santo Spirito.

If you visit Santo Spirito today, you won’t find a trace of the sacred representations, but there are eyewitness accounts and engravings of the shows that were performed in their graveyard starting in 1813. The confraternity there cared for the dead from the hospital and like the brothers at Santa Maria dell'Orazione e Morte, they had access to a large number of unknown or unclaimed bodies. In the days before the medicalization of death, dying at home was considered preferable and a hospital death was often a last resort for people who were poor and alone.

After sunset, theses brothers would come collect the dead from the hospital and carry them out to the cemetery. There, they would open one of the hospital’s 24 mass graves and lower in the naked body with chains. The bodies would stay there, unless they were cast in a sacred representation. A particularly noteworthy performance in 1831 depicted the final judgment. The mass graves were opened and the freshest corpses were costumed and propped up beneath a wax angel blowing the last trumpet. Fortunately, Antoine Jean-Baptiste Thomas left us with an engraving of this particular dramatization.

Starting in the early 19th century, Rome’s confraternities started to get some pushback from the pope on their use of bone and corpses. The final nail in the proverbial coffin of corpse theatre was hammered in when Rome joined unified Italy in 1870. A strict ban on burying people in convents, crypts or hospitals was enforced for the sake of public health. One of the last sacred representations was done at Santa Maria dell'Orazione e Morte in 1880. The brothers there preformed the “Vision of Ezekiel” in secret knowing their cemetery and their performances were about to become a thing of the past. In the end, their customs were as ephemeral as human flesh. 

More on this topic can be found at the recent post Sacred Italian Waxworks or The Last Judgement with Real Corpses, 18th and 19th Century Italy by clicking here.

Image List

1.  Insignia, or stemma, of the Confraternita dell'Orazione e Morte
2. "Chapelle de l'Eglise de la Mort" Engraved by Francois Alexandre Villain after Jean-Baptiste Thomas, Wellcome Images
3-8. Photographs by Elizabeth Harper
9-13. Images of Orazione e Morte on via Giulia ; Photographs from the Archives from the Roman Society of Natural History
14. "Dramatisation of Purgatory" at Santo Spirito; Engraved by Francois Alexandre Villain after Jean-Baptiste Thomas

SOURCES: Amadei, Emma. "Il Culto Dei Morti Nella Roma Dell'Ottocento." Archivio Storico Capitolino. 1 Jan. 1957. Web. 14 Oct. 2014.
L'Arciconfraternita Di S. Maria Dell'Orazione E Morte in Roma E Le Sue Rappresentazioni Sacre. Vol. 33. Rome: Roma, 1910. Print.

New Conference Devoted to 19th Century Eccentric, Naturalist, Traveler and Taxidermist Charles Waterton, July 31 - August 1, West Yorkshire, England

Following is information about a new conference devoted to 19th century eccentric traveler, writer, naturalist and taxidermist Charles Waterton featuring friend of Morbid Anatomy Pat Morris. The conference will take place on July 31 and August 1. Full details follow. You can find out more here. Thanks to Petra Lange Berndt for bringing this to our attention!

An Unconquerable Aversion to Piccadilly: Charles Waterton, Traveler, Taxidermist and Pioneer Conservationist
Society for the History of Natural History conference and AGM
Wakefield, West Yorkshire, Friday 31st July and Saturday 1 August 2015 

The Annual General Meeting of the Society for the History of Natural History will be held in association with a one day conference of talks celebrating the life and work of Charles Waterton (1782-1865) and a second day with related excursions around Wakefield in West Yorkshire.

The Wakefield Museum, at Wakefield One, is currently hosting an exhibition “The extraordinary world of Charles Waterton” and the Society’s meeting will take place at a venue within easy reach of the Museum and will include a visit to the exhibition.
Please download the registration form: Registration form Waterton in Wakefield
Outline Programme

This two-day conference celebrating the life and work of Charles Waterton (1782-1865) will comprise a day of talks on aspects of the life and work of Charles Waterton, the SHNH AGM, and a visit to The Wakefield Museum at Wakefield One to view the exhibition “The extraordinary world of Charles Waterton”. Pat Morris will give a demonstration at Wakefield One on “The inside story” showing how Waterton achieved his results.

Speakers include:

• Jan Graffius, curator at Stonyhurst College, on Waterton’s education and Catholic upbringing;
• Pat Morris on the taxidermy;
• John Whitaker on Waterton’s Wakefield connections;
• Adrian Padfield on the Curare story, and
• John Chalmers on the disagreements between Audubon and Waterton.
• Richard Milner on ‘eccentric naturalists’

This will be followed on the Saturday with a guided walk with David Mee following part of the Waterton trail, taking participants around the former Waterton Estate at Walton Hall, including Waterton’s grave. The meeting place is the Anglers Park Visitor Centre, accessible using local bus services and also has parking.

Please contact the meetings secretary, Gina Douglas, at meetings@shnh.org.uk for more information, or if you would like to be one of the speakers or have an active participation in the event. 

Venue Details

• The meeting venue is the Unity Works and that is at Westgate, Wakefield, WF1 1EP. 
• The Museum address and postcode is: Wakefield One, Burton Street,Wakefield,WF1 2DD. 
• Anglers Country Park, Haw Park Lane, Wintereett, Wakefield WF4 2EB. 

Why “Waterton in Wakefield”?
“Why Wakefield?” seems to be something I get asked when I tell people about the meeting on Charles Waterton. The answer is that he lived close by, in Walton Hall, now a luxury hotel and popular wedding venue.

But the other reason is that Wakefield One, the local museum, currently has on display some of the remarkable taxidermy that Waterton created in the “The extraordinary world of Charles Waterton.”

Those attending the meeting will be able to see that display and also see a demonstration of just how Waterton managed to achieve some of his results: he managed to create hollow taxidermy specimens, with no supports inside.

The conference venue is the Unity Works in Westgate, a converted building, with lifts to the 3rd floor, where we will meet, and short walk from Wakefield Westgate station. There is a free shuttle bus from that station, stopping at Wakefield One, also nearby, the town centre and bus station, and completing the circuit via Wakefield Kirkgate station and the Hepworth museum, as well as many retail outlet shops.

There should be ample parking adjacent to The Unity Works and near the station. The conference dinner will also be held nearby.

On Saturday there will be an opportunity to walk around the Walton hall estate, guided by the Park Ranger and starting from the Waterton Discovery centre at Angler’s Country Park. That has parking and is a kilometre from a bus stop with a service from Wakefield.

The walk will include a visit to Waterton’s grave and the “watch towers” or early “hides” used to protect the wildlife on his estate and stop poaching, part of Waterton’s pioneer work as a conservationist. There is a podcast available which describes part of the walk: go to http://www.wakefield.gov.uk/residents/sport-and-leisure/outdoors/parks-and-countryside/parks/podcasts/waterton-trail- Gina Douglas 

Charles Waterton
Enter ‘Charles Waterton’ as a search item in Google and you get 400,000 hits, evidence of widespread fame and an intriguing life. He was a traveller, ‘larger than life’ person and an inventive taxidermist, now regarded as one of Britain’s great eccentrics. Few of his contemporaries engaged in such a variety of mischief and adventure. His activities, and the aggravation he caused, continue to fascinate, inspire and amuse even 150 years after his death.

Waterton’s famous book Wanderings in South America, published in 1825, described his travels at a time when few people made such journeys. It was re-published many times, exciting acclaim, argument and derision in equal volume. It featured a mischievous taxidermy fabrication (The Nondescript), a new species of mammal or a tiny human; Waterton wouldn’t say. Instead he confided to his physician “I do enjoy a bit of stuffing” and went on to create a collection of weird creatures as well as ‘normal’ specimens.
Taxidermy was his passion. His book devoted 19 pages to his special methods, one of the first detailed instructions in this art to be published in Britain. It was followed by many essays on the subject, rudely dismissive of contemporary taxidermists. He used his skill to fabricate imaginary creatures, forming three-dimensional religious and political cartoons that lampooned issues and people that attracted his ire. His surviving specimens offer a fascinating insight into the skill and ideas of a controversial and idiosyncratic nineteenth century naturalist.

Images (Top to bottom):

1. Charles Waterton, by Charles Willson Peale, oil on canvas, 1824; The National Gallery, London
2. "Nondescript" by Waterton, 19th century. Fashioned from the skin of a howler monkey Waterton sometimes pretended this was a new species of animal he had discovered or a caricature of a customs officer who had charged him import duty on the animal skins. Sourced here.
3. “It was the first and last time I was ever on a Cayman’s back.” Charles Waterton. Coloured etching by R. Cruikshank, 1827, after E. Jones

Sacred Italian Waxworks or The Last Judgement with Real Corpses, 18th and 19th Century Italy

Doing research for my upcoming book on the Anatomical Venus, I came across the following choice tidbit in the excellent Waxing Eloquent: Italian Portraits in Wax (on which more here).

Italy, it explains, never developed a tradition of wax museums as we think of them; instead, it enjoyed a flowering of often macabre sacred waxworks located in confraternities devoted to caring for the dead. It continues:

Despite Italy’s lack of wax museums,the country can claim a pre-eminent role ... of transferring the profane popular amusements of such displays to pious representations that, for more than a century, attracted the devout and curious alike. They were set up by the various confraternities devoted to burying the poor and bodies that had been abandoned in the countryside… The oldest was the archconfraternity of Santa Maria dell’Orazione e Morte… to enhance the solemnity of the octave of the dead in November, the association prepared musical oratorios, artistic biers and sacred representations. The latter were staged in the cemetery under the church, which, in 1762, the provveditore Agostino Ancidoni had decorated entirely with skulls and bones “artistically' arranged to create a lugubrious mise-en-scène. It was also at this time that the representations began to be staged…”

 ... an even more macabre representation was prepared in 1813 when, in the atrium of cemetery of Santo Spirito in Sassia, the scene of the Last Judgment was staged in a singular manner. Set at the feet of a wax angel sounding the trumpet to rouse the dead and call them to the Last Judgment, at the end of the pits were the real corpses of those who had died the previous night at the adjacent hospital. 

You can read more in Waxing Eloquent: Italian Portraits in Wax, edited by Andrea Daninos; find out more--or buy a copy!--here.

Image: Santa Maria dell'Orazione e Morte, Rome; Dorli Photography on Flickr

For more on this topic, see Corpse Theatre in the Sacred Spaces of Italy: Guest post by Elizabeth Harper, All The Saints You Should Know Blog by clicking here.

Transmitting Thought: The Maimonides Dream Lab: A New Film by Ronni Thomas for Morbid Anatomy Museum Presents!

Below, Filmmaker in Residence Ronni Thomas--director of The Midnight Archive--introduces the newest episode of his Morbid Anatomy Museum Presents film series. Entitled "Transmitting Thought: The Maimonides Dream Lab," this short film introduces us to psychologist Dr. Stanley Krippner's provocative explorations of telepathic sensitivity and the dream state undertaken in 1960s Brooklyn.

You can view the film above or by clicking here; Stay tuned for more episodes which will premiere monthly on our new You Tube channel, which can be found here!

It is easy to subscribe to a set of rules when those rules are set by science rather than religion. But science lives with a bias -- that in order for an idea to be explored it must be observable, measurable and repeatable. Yet the irrational is part of our world, especially when it comes to the subject of human consciousness. Current scientific thinking brings an almost religious devotion to debunking anything that appears "irrational" or outside the rules and norms of core science. 

But such an approach leaves tremendous gaps in our understanding -- especially in questions of ESP, precognition, and other queries into non-physical intelligence. But this was not always the case. For a brief time, from roughly the 1930s to the 1960s, the field of academic parapsychology flourished in the United States. And at the forefront of the field was the American psychologist Dr. Stanley Krippner. In this film, Krippner discusses his research at the Maimonides Dream Lab in Brooklyn, NY in the 1960s. There, he and his colleagues conducted studies that explored the use of telepathy within the altered state of dreaming. 

Through numerous experiments, including one with the rock band The Grateful Dead, the Maimonides team produced substantial scientific research on the topic of ‘dream telepathy,’ until the demise of the lab's funding. Learn what we know -- and what we lost -- in Transmitting Thought : the Maimonides Dream Lab.  

— Ronni Thomas, Director

Animated Gif of an Ivory Anatomical Manikin Undergoing Auto Dissection

I found this wonderful ivory anatomical manikin imagination on the blog of the Special Collections, Archives, and Rare Books at the University of Missouri Libraries via the wonderful Tumblr account of Paula A. Ruiz, who kindly answered my recent call for imagery related to the Anatomical Venus.

More on the piece, sourced from the blog, below;  you can read the whole piece, and see more images, by clicking here.

... This object is an ivory anatomical manikin that belongs to the collection of the J. Otto Lottes Health Sciences Library here at the University of Missouri. It is probably German, dates from the eighteenth century, and is about 11 inches long...

Ivory manikins such as this one may have been used as educational tools by male doctors.  It’s not clear who was the intended audience for the objects. Were they used to demonstrate basic anatomy to medical students? Or laypeople? Or were they simply luxury objects, curiosities to be kept in a doctor’s study?

Most of the ivory anatomical manikins still extant today are pregnant females. The artist of this figure even connected the fetus to the womb with a small piece of thread to represent the umbilical cord.  Whether or not the imagination was something the original owner of this figure considered, we do not know.

Dilettanti Society in The Morbid Anatomy Library with Special Guest Mike Zohn of TV's Oddities! Decoding the Visual Language of Alchemy! Arcane Media! Upcoming Morbid Anatomy Events

We have many wonderful events coming up at Morbid Anatomy! 

First up, we have A Thief's Guide to Alchemy: Part 1, On the Language and Image or How to Read an Alchemical Text with alchemist Brian Cotnoir (Wednesday, June 3rd; tickets and more here). The next evening we'll be hosting the first iteration of the Dilettanti Society Happy Hour Cocktails and Show and Tell in the Morbid Anatomy Library presented by Art in the Age. This week's guest will be Mike Zohn of TV's Oddities, who will be presenting his collection of ancient and modern penises (Thursday, June 4th at 6:30 PM; tickets and more here). Later that evening will be a presentation of Arcane Media in the form of glass slides, magic lantern projections, and antique technologies (Thursday, June 4th at 8:00 PM; tickets and more here) followed the next night by Psychedelics and Death: A Brief Introduction with Psychotherapist Dr. Neal (Friday, June 5th; more info here).

We are also delighted to announce one new event: My Grandfather the Spirit Doctor and Me: On Medicine, Storytelling, Film and The Radio Illustrated Lecture with Chiara Ambrosio, London Based Filmmaker; this will take place on Monday, June 22nd at 8pm; Tickets and more info here.  

Following is a list of all upcoming events; we highly recommend purchasing tickets in advance! You can also become a member and be alerted about events before they are announced to the general public by clicking here.  

The Morbid Anatomy Museum is a non-profit, and depends on donations and memberships to survive. If you appreciate what we do, please consider becoming a member or making a fully tax deductible donation today. Donations can be made here, and you can become a member--with assorted perks such as discounted admissions and free museum entry by clicking here.

IMMEDIATELY UPCOMING EVENTS

• A Thief's Guide to Alchemy: Part I - Alchemy it's Language and Image or How to Read an Alchemical Text. An Illustrated Lecture with alchemist and author Brian Cotnoir. 
  Wednesday, June 3rd, 8pm - 10pm, $10 (3 lecture pass - $25), Tickets (and more info) here.

• Morbid Anatomy and Art in the Age Present: The Dilettanti Society Happy Hour - Cocktails and Show and Tell in the Morbid Anatomy Library featuring Mike Zohn of TV's Oddities, who will be presenting his collection of ancient and modern penises
  Thursday June 4th, 6:30pm - 8pm, $20 ($12 for members), LIMITED SEATING, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Arcane Project: An Evening of Glass slides, Magic Lantern Projections, and Antique Technologies. 
  Thursday, June 4th, 8pm - 10pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• Psychedelics and Death: A Brief Introduction. An Illustrated Lecture with Psychotherapist Dr. Neal 
  Friday, June 5th, 8pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

NEWLY ANNOUNCED EVENTS

• My Grandfather the Spirit Doctor and Me: On Medicine, Storytelling, Film and The Radio Illustrated Lecture with Chiara Ambrosio, London Based Filmmaker
  Monday, June 22nd, 8pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

ALL UPCOMING EVENTS

• A Thief's Guide to Alchemy: Part I - Alchemy it's Language and Image or How to Read an Alchemical Text. An Illustrated Lecture with alchemist and author Brian Cotnoir. 
  Wednesday, June 3rd, 8pm - 10pm, $10 (3 lecture pass - $25), Tickets (and more info) here.

• Morbid Anatomy and Art in the Age Present: The Dilettanti Society Happy Hour - Cocktails and Show and Tell in the Morbid Anatomy Library featuring Mike Zohn of TV's Oddities presenting his collection of ancient and modern penises
  Thursday June 4th, 6:30pm - 8pm, $20 ($12 for members), LIMITED SEATING, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Arcane Project: An evening of glass slides, magic lantern projections, and antique technologies. 
  Thursday, June 4th, 8pm - 10pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• Psychedelics and Death: A Brief Introduction. An Illustrated Lecture with Psychotherapist Dr. Neal 
  Friday, June 5th, 8pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

• Anthropomorphic Rabbit Taxidermy Class with Divya Anantharaman 
  Saturday, June 6th, 12pm - 7pm, $300 (includes admission to the museum), $300, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Fancy Chicken Taxidermy Class with Divya Anatharaman
  Sunday, June 7th, 12pm - 7pm, $400 (includes admission to the museum), SOLD OUT (info here)

• A Thief's Guide to Alchemy: Part 2 - Alchemy: Substance and Symbol. An Illustrated Lecture with alchemist and author Brian Cotnoir. Wednesday, June 10th, 8pm - 10pm, $10 (3 lecture pass - $25), Tickets (and more info) here.

• Capulet Gynecologist, Montague Onanist: Medieval Sex, Renaissance Death, and Romeo and Juliet. An Illustrated Lecture with Lois Leveen 
  Thursday June 11th, 8pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• Anthropomorphic Insect Shadowbox Workshop with Daisy Tainton Saturday 
  Saturday, June 13th, 1pm - 4 pm, $75, Tickets (and more info) here

• A Thief's Guide to Alchemy: Part 3 - Alchemical Methods and Tools both Physical and Metaphysical.  An Illustrated Lecture with alchemist and author Brian Cotnoir. 
  Wednesday, June 17th, 8pm - 10pm, $10 (3 lecture pass - $25), Tickets (and more info) here

• Tarantula Preservation Class Thursday with Divya Anantharaman
  Thursday, June 18th, 6:30pm - 9:30pm, $80 (includes admission to the museum), SOLD OUT (info here)

• The Emerald Tablet - Alchemical Distilation Workshop with Brian Cotnoir. 
  Saturday, June 20th, 12pm - 6pm, $100, Tickets (and more info) here.

• My Grandfather the Spirit Doctor and Me: On Medicine, Storytelling, Film and The Radio Illustrated Lecture with Chiara Ambrosio, London Based Filmmaker
  Monday, June 22nd, 8pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

• A Desire for Dramaticism: Semiotics of the 1980s Goth Subculture: An illustrated lecture with Andi Harriman 
  Tuesday, June 23rd, 8pm - 10 pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

• Search for the Sacred Heart of Jesus, An Illustrated Lecture with Peter Nevramont. 
  Wednesday, June 24th, 8pm - 10pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here

• "Witchcraft Through the Ages” (Haxan) – Polka music! Butter Churns!! 16mm silent film screening with Victrola!!! Presented and choreographed by Joel Schlemowitz 
  Thursday, June 25th, 8pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

• "Witchcraft Through the Ages” (Haxan) – Polka music! Butter Churns!! 16mm silent film screening with Victrola!!! Presented and choreographed by Joel Schlemowitz 
  Thursday, June 26th, 8pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)
  

• Morbid Anatomy Flea Market
  Sunday, June 28th, 12pm - 6pm, FREE, more info here.
  

• Madness and Meaning: An Illustrated Lecture with Andrew Scull, Author of Madness in Civilization: A Cultural History of Insanity, from the Bible to Freud, from the Madhouse to Modern Medicine
  Monday, June 29th, 8pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Movie Mike Presents : Morbid Movie Madness - A Survey of Serials of the 30s and 40s First Chapters of Thrilling Tales in 16mm!
  Saturday, June 30th, $10, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Now You See It, Now You Don't: The Psychology of Magic, an Illustrated Lecture with Robert Teszka 
  Thursday, July 2nd, 8pm - 10pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• The Right Mixture: The Theory and History of the Four Humours (as told with cocktails), an Illustrated lecture with Michael Goyette, PhD 
  Thursday, July 9th, 8pm - 10pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• Psychedelics and Death: A Brief Introduction. An Illustrated Lecture with Psychotherapist Dr. Neal  
  Friday July 10th, 8pm - 10pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here).

• Anthropomorphic Mouse Taxidermy Class, One or Two Headed! with Divya Anantharaman
  Saturday, July 11th, 12pm - 6pm, $110 for one, $125 for two headed (all tickets include admission to the museum), SOLD OUT (info here).

• Chick Taxidermy Class with Divya Anantharaman 
  Sunday, July 12th, 12pm-6:30pm,  $185 for one, $200 for two headed (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Stolen Armor, Bullet Sculptures, Photos of the Dead: Soldiers' Souvenirs, or The Things They Carried (Home). A Panel with Joanna Scutts, Lauren Walsh and Susan Harlan 
  Tuesday July 14th, 8pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• 'The Gothic Sensibility: Victorian 'Gloomths' and the Contemporary 'Death Curious': An Illustrated Lecture with Romany Reagan. 
  Tuesday, July 21st, 8pm - 10pm, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

• Placebos, Nocebos and Voodoo Medicine, An Illustrated Lecture with Mark W Green MD, FAAN Professor of Neurology, Anesthesiology, and Rehabilitation Medicine 
  Wednesday, July 22nd, 8pm - 10pm, Tickets (and more info) here

• Jackalope Taxidermy Class with Katie Innamorato 
  Saturday, July 25th, 12pm - 6pm, $250 (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Rat/Guinea Pigs Taxidermy Class with Katie Innamorato 
  Sunday, July 26th, 12pm - 6pm, $200 (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Movie Mike Presents : Morbid Movie Madness - Bluebeard with John Carradine as the serial strangler of women in old Paris in 16mm!
  Tuesday, July 28th, 8pm, $10, Tickets (and more info) here.

• 'The Gothic Sensibility: Victorian 'Gloomths' and the Contemporary 'Death Curious' : An Illustrated Lecture with Romany Reagan 
  Friday, July 29th, 8pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

• The Even More Disturbing and Absurd World of Medical Patents: An Illustrated Lecture with Eric Indin, Registered Patent Attorney. 
  Thursday, July 30th,  8pm - 10pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Chipmunk Taxidermy Class with Divya Anantharaman
  Saturday, August 1st, 12pm - 6pm, $185 (all tickets include admission to the museum), SOLD OUT ( info here)

• Skunk Taxidermy Class with Divya Anantharaman
  Sunday, August 2nd, 12pm - 6pm, $450 (includes admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Evening Anthropomorphic Mouse Taxidermy Class with Divya Anantharaman 
  Wednesday, August 5th, 6:30pm - 10:30pm, $110 (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Psychedelics and Death: A Brief Introduction: An Illustrated Lecture with Psychotherapist Dr. Neal Goldsmith
  Friday, August 7th, 8pm - 10 PM, $8, SOLD OUT (info here)

• The Embalmed Head of Oliver Cromwell: A Memoir: An Illustrated Lecture with Mark Hartzman
  Wednesday, August 19th, 8pm, $8, Tickets (and more info) here.

• Starling Taxidermy Class with Katie Innamorato 
  Saturday, August 22nd, 12pm - 6pm, $275 (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Rat/ Guinea Pig with Wings Gaff Taxidermy Class with Katie Innamorato 
  Sunday, August 23rd, 12pm - 6pm, $235 (all tickets include admission to the museum), Tickets (and more info) here

• Hannibal Lecter, Book Collector, An Illustrated Lecture with Elisabeth Brander, Rare Book Librarian at Washington University 
  Thursday, October 8th, 8pm, Tickets (and more info) here

Image: Dilettanti Members by Sir Joshua Reynolds