Joanna Ebenstein Livres

For centuries, humankind has sought to know itself through an understanding of the body, in sickness and in health, inside and out. This fascination left in its wake a rich body of artworks that demonstrate not only the facts of the human body, but also the ways in which our ideas about the body and its proper representation have changed over time. At times both beautiful and repulsive, illustrated anatomy continues to hold our interest today, and is frequently referenced in popular culture. Anatomica brings together some of the most striking, fascinating and bizarre artworks from the 16th through to the 20th century, exploring human anatomy in one beautiful volume.

The ultimate death compendium, featuring the world's most extraordinary artistic objects concerned with mortality, together with text by expert contributors

Embracing mortality serves as the foundation for a more fulfilling life, encouraging readers to confront their fears and uncertainties. This transformative guide offers practical insights and strategies to help individuals appreciate the present moment, cultivate deeper connections, and prioritize what truly matters. By accepting the inevitability of death, readers are empowered to lead more authentic and meaningful lives, ultimately fostering personal growth and a renewed sense of purpose.

Beneath the original Venetian glass and rosewood case at La Specola in Florence lies Clemente Susini's Anatomical Venus (c. 1790), a perfect object whose luxuriously bizarre existence challenges belief. It - or, better, she - was conceived as a means to teach human anatomy without the need for constant dissection, which was messy, ethically fraught and subject to quick decay. This life-sized wax woman is adorned with glass eyes and human hair and can be dismembered into dozens of parts revealing, at the final remove, a tranquil foetus curled in her womb. Sister models soon appeared throughout Europe, where they not only instructed the specialist students, but also delighted the general public. The Anatomical Venus is a celebration of these female wax models and reveals their evolution from wax effigy to fetish figure and the embodiment of the uncanny. Today, these images trouble the edges of our neat categorical divides between life and death, science and religion, body and soul, effigy and ecstasy, spectacle and education, kitsch and fine art. Skilfully written by a curator of the macabre, the beautiful and the spiritual, this is a meticulously illustrated survey of these anatomical odalisques and the cultural and artistic intersection they inhabit.

Compelling and alluring, this disquieting volume presents a host of deftly crafted dissectable female wax models and "slashed beauties" created to demonstrate anatomy in museums and fairgrounds around the world in the 18th and 19th centuries. Incisive commentary reveals the evolution of these enigmatic and sensual sculptures from the death masks, wax effigies and votive offerings of the Renaissance, and later to artist's muse, erotic fetish and the embodiment of the uncanny

"An illustrated, abridged translation of Dutch anatomist and museologist Frederk Ruysch's Thesaurus Anatomicus"-- Provided by publisher