The Wunderkammer Olbricht, Curated by Kunstkammer Georg Laue, Me Collectors Room, Berlin

One of our New Years Resolutions here at Morbid Anatomy is to sort and process forgotten photographs from trips gone by. To that end, here are some photos from a visit to the Kunstkammer Georg Laue-curated Wunderkammer Olbricht at Berlin's Me Collectors Room taken back in 2010; you can see a full set of image by clicking here. Below is information about the collection from the gallery website; you can find out more by clicking here.

THE WUNDERKAMMER OLBRICHT
The practice of maintaining ‘cabinets of curiosities’ evolved during the Renaissance and Baroque. Such cabinets were collectors’ rooms in which precious artworks (artificialia), rare phenomena of nature (naturalia), scientific instruments (scientifica), objects from strange worlds (exotica), and inexplicable items (mirabilia) were preserved. They reflected the standard of knowledge and view of the world at that time.

Berlin also had its Kunstkammer. Founded by Elector Joachim II (ruled 1535 – 1571) and almost completely destroyed during the Thirty Years War, it was rebuilt by Elector Friedrich Wilhelm and eventually found its home under Friedrich III in the newly expanded Stadtschloss (City Palace). Today the few remaining objects have been distributed around different museums that have become the successors to the cabinet of curiosities, albeit in a thematically differentiated way.

Our Wunderkammer reanimates this tradition in Berlin once more. It provides an insight into the past and manages to fulfil its original intention of some two to five centuries ago: to transport the visitor into a realm of sheer astonishment—whether by means of the legendary unicorn, ultimately exposed as the tusk of a narwhal, an amber mirror flooded with light fashioned from the “Gold of the North”, the coconut chalice that came into the possession of Alexander von Humboldt and which is adorned with images of Brazilian cannibals, preserved specimens of a Nile crocodile and a great blue turaco, or wooden cabinets that only reveal their mysteries to the curious eye.

The quality of the objects, numbering in excess of 200 from the Renaissance and Baroque periods, is unique and makes the Wunderkammer Olbricht one of the most important private collections of its kind.

The Kunstkammer Georg Laue, Munich, is responsible for the conception, the installation, and supervision of the Wunderkammer Olbricht.

From 18th Century Private Natural History Cabinet to Early Museum: The Spallanzani Museum, Reggio Emilia, Italy; Guest Post by Alessandro Molinengo, Nautilus Shop, Modena

 

Friend Alessandro Molinengo, co-proprietor of the Modena's amazing Nautilus Antiques, brought Evan Michelson and I one rainy night to visit to Spallanzani Museum in Reggio Emilia, Italy. The origins of this museum stem from a "small collection of natural products" opened by priest, biologist and physiologist Lazzaro Spallanzani in his home in 1770; today, the collection--some still in their original cases!--is located in the Civic Museum of Reggio Emilia.

I asked Alessandro to write a guest post telling the readers of Morbid Anatomy more about this astounding collection, which had Evan and I literally gasping aloud as we turned each corner; All images are my own; you can see many many more by clicking here or here:

Lazzaro Spallanzani (10 January 1729 – 12 February 1799) was an Italian Catholic priest, biologist and physiologist who made important contributions to the experimental study of bodily functions, animal reproduction, and essentially animal echolocation. His research of biogenesis paved the way for the investigations of Louis Pasteur. 

Since 1771 he had managed to create a Museum of Natural History in Pavia, which over the years acquired a great reputation, even internationally, and was even visited by the Emperor Joseph II of Austria. 

In 1785, while on a trip to Constantinople and the Balkans, he was accused by the custodian of the Museum of Pavia (instigated by some colleagues) of stealing artifacts from the museum: the story ended after one year with the demonstration of the complete innocence of Spallanzani and punishment of slanderers. 

His indefatigable exertions as a traveler, his skill and good fortune as a collector, his brilliance as a teacher and expositor, and his keenness as a conversationalist no doubt aided largely in accounting for Spallanzani's exceptional fame among his contemporaries; his letters account for his close relationships with many famed scholars and philosophers, like Buffon, Lavoisier, and Voltaire. 

His life was one of incessant eager questioning of nature on all sides, and his many and varied works all bear the stamp of a fresh and original genius, capable of stating and solving problems in all departments of science. 

He died from bladder cancer on 12 February 1799, in Pavia. After his death, his bladder was removed for study by his colleagues, after which it was placed on public display in a museum in Pavia, where it remains to this day. 

Since 1770, Lazzaro Spallanzani set up in the rooms of his home in Scandiano a "small collection of natural products,"which today is located in the Civic Museums of Reggio Emilia. 

It’s a rare and precious document in the history of collecting naturalistic ranked according to scientific knowledge at the end of the eighteenth century. It includes zoological, with particular reference to marine life, paleontological, mineralogical, lithological and botanical gardens, as well as decorative objects, such as pictures, tables and ornaments, testifying, in its diversity, the variety of interests of the scientist. The materials are the result of purchases, exchanges and collections made during the many trips Spallanzani during the summer months, to conduct scientific experiments, and to procure materials for the Museum of Natural History of the University of Pavia.

Purchased by the Municipality of Reggio Emilia in 1799, at the death of scientist, collection has been preserved in its original consistency, finding final location in the Palazzo of St. Francis from the 1830. The current layout of the exhibition is related to the reorganization of collections in 1883 by Alfredo Jona, displayed in several cabinets, some of which are original furnishings of the Spallanzani’s house, following the Linnaean system in use in the late eighteenth century.

You can find out more about the by the Spallanzani Museum of Reggio Emilia by clicking here. All images are my own (click on image to see larger versions); you can see many more by clicking here or here. You can find out more about the Nautilus Shop by clicking here, and can "like" the shop on Facebook by clicking here. The shop is open on Saturdays from 3 until 7 PM or by appointment, and is located at via Cesare Battisti 60 in Modena, Italy.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Morbid Anatomy Going Away Party and More Upcoming Events and Workshops

In just under two weeks, Morbid Anatomy is leaving Brooklyn and taking to the road! My first stop will be Italy, where I and Evan Michelson--star of TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library scholar in residence--will be spending three weeks collecting material for our ongoing book project investigating, in words and pictures, "the history of Western culture as revealed through the preservation and display of the human corpse." Evan and I plan to post regularly here about the amazing things we encounter, so stay tuned for that. In the short term, you can find out more about our project here.
After this, I will make my way  to London, where I will linger for about six months, producing along the way another series of lectures and events for the wonderful Hackney-based Last Tuesday Society and working on a few other projects; stay tuned for further details on that.

But anxious New York-based Morbid Anatomists, please do not despair! Morbid Anatomy Presents will continue on here much as before, in the able hands of Morbid Anatomy Head Librarian Laetitia Barbier, who will be overseeing the library and producing events in my stead. That said, if you would like to bid adieu to the current incarnation of Morbid Anatomy while also enjoying an illustrated lecture on the Victorian love of death with the artsinal cocktails and music of Friese Undine, I would love to see you this Friday, February 8th, for my "Victorian Love Affair with Death and the Art of Mourning Hair Jewelry/Morbid Anatomy Going Away Party" spectacular! Full details below.

If that does not interest, we have many more offerings in the coming weeks to intrigue and delight; for example, tomorrow night (Thursday, Feb. 7) we have Blake Schwarzenbach of the seminal punk band "Jawbreaker" and "Jets to Brazil" waxing poetic on "death as muse" and playing a musical set; later, we have a newly announced "Bat Skeleton in Glass Dome" workshop (finished piece shown above; March 3); an illustrated lecture on the cult of beautiful death in Vienna with drinks and music (February 12); two raccoon head taxidermy classes with rogue taxidermist Katie Innamorato (Feb. 9 and 23); and, for that special day, a Valentine's Day themed insect shadowbox class (Feb. 10) and a Valentine's Day lecture and reading with Tattoo Scholars Anna Felicity Friedman and Matt Lodder (Feb. 14)

Full details follow on all events; hope very much to see you at one or more of these terrific events!

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Death As Muse: An Intimate Evening With Blake Schwarzenbach, Musician, Painter, Jawbreaker, Forgetter
Date: Thursday, February 7
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: $5
Presented by Morbid Anatomy'

From Dante to Donnie Darko perhaps no other idea has inspired more creative pursuits than life’s final act: death. Love, it could be argued, is a close second—and if that’s the case, let us bow down yet again to Woody Allen’s film, Love and Death.

Which brings us to the man at the darkened heart of tonight’s event: Blake Schwarzenbach, who has sampled a line from one of Mr. Allen’s films in a song. Schwarzenbach, you see, also knows from love and death.

As the singer, songwriter, and guitarist for the late, much-loved Bay Area punk trio Jawbreaker, Schwarzenbach once sang: “We met in rain, you asked me in, seemed like a good sign. Now I need a guillotine to get you off my mind.”

 With his newest group, Forgetters, he's gone darker.
How dark?

Here’s the cold data: Over 11 bloody tracks on the band’s eponymous–and somewhat psychedelic–new record, released in late 2012, there are roughly 27 lyrical variations on the word “death.” And there are multiple instances within just one song title: “O Deadly Death.”
That’s not to say Schwarzenbach doesn’t have a sense of humor. On an earlier Forgetters EP, after all, he cleverly made a verb out of tennis great John McEnroe (to throw a McEnroe is to have a very public fit.)

It is, in fact, the sui generis way Schwarzenbach balances light and dark, wit and warts, romance and rancor—both musically and lyrically—that makes his creative work so compelling. Or, as the writer Maccabee Montandon has put it: Schwarzenbach’s songs are “bounding, literate, often hyper-local anthems about pony-keg-powered house parties, girls he adored, girls he did not adore and books. Kerouac and cop killing live in a single lyrical line.”
On this evening, Schwarzenbach and Montandon will discuss the music, muses, and more: Schwarzenbach has grown increasingly interested in visual arts, painting and sculpting prolifically in his Brooklyn apartment; some of his pieces will be on display tonight. Following the conversation, Schwarzenbach will play solo acoustic versions of a few of his songs and take questions from the crowd. His own personal nine circles of hell revealed!

Image: "Impossible t-shirts" (a series). Blake Schwarzenbach. Pen, acrylic, graph paper. 2012.
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The Victorian Love Affair with Death and the Art of Mourning Hair Jewelry: Morbid Anatomy Going Away Party and Part Three of "Hairy Secrets" Series
Illustrated lecture with Art Historian and Master Jeweler Karen Bachmann and Morbid Anatomy Going Away Party, with Cocktails and Music by Friese Undine
Date: Friday, February 8 (Formerly January 31; Please note date change)
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: $10
Presented by Morbid Anatomy
***Part 3 of a 3 part series "Hairy Secrets: Human Relic as Memory Object in Victorian Mourning Jewelry"

The Victorians had a love affair with death which they expressed in a variety of ways, both intensely sentimental and macabre. Tonight's lecture--the last in a 3-part series on human relics and Victorian mourning jewelry--will take as its focus the apex of the phenomenon of hair jewelry fashion in the Victorian Era as an expression of this passion. Nineteenth century mourning rituals will be discussed, with a particular focus on Victorian hairwork jewelry, both palette worked and table worked. Also discussed will be the historical roots of the Victorian fascination with death, such as high mortality rates for both adults and children, the rise of the park cemetery, and the death of Queen Victoria's beloved Prince Albert and her subsequent fashion-influencing 40-year mourning period. Historical samples of hair art and jewelry from the lecturer's personal collection will also be shown.

Karen Bachmann is a fine jeweler with over 25 years experience, including several years on staff as a master jeweler at Tiffany & Co. She is a Professor in the Jewelry Design Dept at Fashion Institute of Technology as well as the School of Art & Design at Pratt Institute. She has recently completed her MA in Art History at SUNY Purchase with a thesis entitled "Hairy Secrets; Human Relic as Memory Object in Victorian Mourning Jewelry". In her downtime she enjoys collecting biological specimens, amateur taxidermy and punk rock.
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Raccoon Head Taxidermy Class with Rogue Taxidermist Katie Innamorato
Date: Saturday, February 9
Time: 11 – 5 PM
Admission: $350
***SOLD OUT; Email morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com to be added to wait list
This class is part of The Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

This course will introduce students to basic and fundamental taxidermy techniques and procedures. Students will be working with donated raccoon skins and will be going through the steps to do a head mount. The class is only available to 5 students, allowing for more one on one interaction and assistance. Students will be working with tanned and lightly prepped skin; there will be no skinning of the animals in class. This is a great opportunity to learn the basic steps to small and large mammal taxidermy. All materials will be supplied by the instructor, and you will leave class with your own raccoon head mount.

Rogue taxidermist Katie Innamorato has a BFA in sculpture from SUNY New Paltz, has been featured on the hit TV show "Oddities," and has had her work featured at La Luz de Jesus gallery in Los Angeles, California. She is self and professionally taught, and has won multiple first place ribbons and awards at the Garden State Taxidermy Association Competition. Her work is focussed on displaying the cyclical connection between life and death and growth and decomposition. Katie is a member of the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists, and with all M.A.R.T. members she adheres to strict ethical guidelines when acquiring specimens and uses roadkill, scrap, and donated skins to create mounts.
Her website and blogs-
www.afterlifeanatomy.com
www.afterlifeanatomy.tumblr.com
www.facebook.com/afterlifeanatomy
www.etsy.com/shop/afterlifeanatomy
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Anthropomorphic Insect Shadowbox Workshop: Special Valentine's Day Edition, with Former AMNH Senior Insect Preparator Daisy Tainton
With Daisy Tainton, Former Senior Insect Preparator at the American Museum of Natural History
Date: Sunday, February 10 (Special Valentine's Day Edition!)
Time: 1 - 4 PM
Admission: $65
***Must RSVP to morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com to be added to class list
This class is part of The Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Today, join former AMNH Senior Insect Preparator Daisy Tainton for a special Valentine's Day-themed edition of Observatory's popular Anthropomorphic Insect Shadowbox Workshop. In this class, students will work with Rhinoceros beetles: nature's tiny giants. Each student will learn to make--and leave with their own!--shadowbox dioramas featuring carefully positioned beetles doing nearly anything you can imagine. Beetles and shadowboxes are provided, and an assortment of miniature furniture, foods, and other props will be available to decorate your habitat. Students need bring nothing, though are encouraged to bring along dollhouse props if they have a particular vision for their final piece; 1:12 scale work best.

Daisy Tainton was formerly Senior Insect Preparator at the American Museum of Natural History, and has been working with insects professionally for several years. Eventually her fascination with insects and  love of Japanese miniature food items naturally came together, resulting in cute and ridiculous museum-inspired yet utterly unrealistic dioramas. Beetles at the dentist? Beetles eating pie and knitting sweaters? Even beetles on the toilet? Why not?
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"Schöne Leiche," or "The Beautiful Corpse": The Cult of Beautiful Death in Vienna
Illustrated lecture by Mark 'Splatter' Batelli, with music and thematic cocktails
Date: Tuesday, February 12
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: $8
Presented by Morbid Anatomy

Tonight's highly illustrated lecture will explore the special Viennese relationship to death as exemplified by their notion of Schöne Leiche, or the "Beautiful Corpse." Batelli will trace the history of this distinctive approach to mortality and discuss funerary customs, mourning culture, black humor, idiom, art, music, suicide and psychology, providing examples and exploring its origins and development in the former imperial capital. Before and after the lecture, enjoy special thematic "Death in Vienna" cocktails and music.

Mark 'Splatter' Batelli is an artist based in Brooklyn, New York. He lived 5 years In Berlin and traveled extensively travels through Europe, spending much time in Vienna.
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Tragic Tattoo Tales: A Valentine’s Day Lecture and Reading with Tattoo Scholars Anna Felicity Friedman and Matt Lodder
Illustrated lecture and reading with tattoo scholars Anna Felicity Friedman and Matt Lodder
Date: Thursday, February 14 (Yes, Valentine's Day!)
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: $5
Presented by Morbid Anatomy

Love, loss… and disfigurement, murder, and flayed skin (with a bit of cannibalism and sadism thrown in for good measure). What better way to spend your Valentine’s Day evening than to join us for a glass of red wine, a bite of delicious chocolate, and a lecture on the history of tattooing combined with a reading of a series of historical tattoo-centered short stories by authors such as Roald Dahl (1958), Saki (1911), Junichiro Tanazaki (1910) and John Rickman (1781)?

Tonight, please join us for an evening with tattoo scholars Anna Felicity Friedman and Matt Lodder (both heavily tattooed themselves) who will lecture about and read tales that interweave tattoo history with romance and the macabre. Through illustrated slide lectures, Drs. Friedman and Lodder will present comparative historical material to provide context and deeper understanding and to separate fact from fiction. Learn about wide ranging tattoo topics in both Western and non-Western cultures and have questions answered that the stories raise. Did people really preserve tattooed skin? What were people reading about tattoos in the early twentieth century? Were Maori really tattooed head to foot? What were the connections between Ukiyo-e and Japanese tattooing in the Edo period?

And the stories… Come hear the account of a young Maori woman and an English sailor who had himself completely tattooed to gain her favor, only to be forcibly returned to his ship (in John Rickman’s 1781 travel narrative from Captain James Cook’s third voyage). Cringe at the tale of a businessman tattooed in Italy with an elaborate scene, but who was prohibited from ever showing it to anyone, swimming, or leaving the country (in Saki’s 1911 “The Background”). Shudder at the story of a Japanese woman lured into a tattooer’s studio, drugged, and forcibly tattooed (in Junichiro Tanazaki’s 1910 “Shisei (The Tattooer)”. Enjoy the fantasy of a young and not-yet famous Chaim Soutine who, during a bacchanalian evening, rendered a dorsal portrait of a tattoo artist’s wife that later mysteriously turns up as a “canvas” in an art gallery (in Roald Dahl’s 1952 “Skin”). Additional images related to the stories will be screened during the readings.
Chocolate and red wine will make things festive.

Anna Felicity Friedman has been researching the history of tattooing for over 20 years. Her recently completed PhD, from the University of Chicago, focuses on tattooed transculturites—Europeans and Americans who acquired non-Western tattoos as part of a process of cultural identity transformation. Her photoblog, Tattoo History Daily, offers glimpses into myriad aspects of tattoo history. An interdisciplinary scholar, she has taught, written, and lectured about body art, maps, rare books, and other sundry topics, works as a freelance curator, and currently teaches hybrid literature/film/art courses at the University of Chicago.

Matt Lodder is a London-based art historian. His work is primarily concerned with the history of Western tattooing and the artistic status of body art and body modification practices including tattooing, body piercing and cosmetic surgery. He writes regularly for Total Tattoo magazine, gives public lectures on tattoo history and related topics, works as a freelance writer and broadcaster for both radio and television, and teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses in contemporary art and theory at the University of Reading and the University of Birmingham. He is currently writing a book called 'Tattoo: An Art History' for IB Tauris, due for publication in 2014.
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Raccoon Head Taxidermy Class with Rogue Taxidermist Katie Innamorato
Date: Saturday, February 23
Time: 11 – 5 PM
Admission: $350
***SOLD OUT; Email morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com to be added to wait list
This class is part of The Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

This course will introduce students to basic and fundamental taxidermy techniques and procedures. Students will be working with donated raccoon skins and will be going through the steps to do a head mount. The class is only available to 5 students, allowing for more one on one interaction and assistance. Students will be working with tanned and lightly prepped skin; there will be no skinning of the animals in class. This is a great opportunity to learn the basic steps to small and large mammal taxidermy. All materials will be supplied by the instructor, and you will leave class with your own raccoon head mount.

Rogue taxidermist Katie Innamorato has a BFA in sculpture from SUNY New Paltz, has been featured on the hit TV show "Oddities," and has had her work featured at La Luz de Jesus gallery in Los Angeles, California. She is self and professionally taught, and has won multiple first place ribbons and awards at the Garden State Taxidermy Association Competition. Her work is focussed on displaying the cyclical connection between life and death and growth and decomposition. Katie is a member of the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists, and with all M.A.R.T. members she adheres to strict ethical guidelines when acquiring specimens and uses roadkill, scrap, and donated skins to create mounts.
Her website and blogs-
www.afterlifeanatomy.com
www.afterlifeanatomy.tumblr.com
www.facebook.com/afterlifeanatomy
www.etsy.com/shop/afterlifeanatomy
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Bat Skeleton in Glass Dome Workshop: Part of DIY Wunderkammer Series
With Wilder Duncan (formerly of Evolution Shop, Soho) and Laetitia Barbier, head librarian at The Morbid Anatomy Library
Date: Sunday, March 3
Time: 1 – 6 PM
Admission: $200
*** MUST RSVP to Laetitia [at] atlasobscura.com to RSVP
This class is part of the DIY Wunderkammer Series and The Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

In this class, students will learn how to create an osteological preparation of a bat in the fashion of 19th century zoological displays. A bat skeleton, a glass dome, branches, glue, tools, and all necessary materials will be provided for each student, but one should feel welcome to bring small feathers, stones, dried flowers, dead insects, natural elements, or any other materials s/he might wish to include in his/her composition. Students will leave the class with a visually striking, fully articulated, “lifelike” bat skeleton posed in a 10” tall glass dome. This piece can, in conjunction with the other creations in the DIY Wunderkammer workshop series, act as the beginning of a genuine collection of curiosities!

This class is part of the DIY Wunderkammer workshop series, curated by Laetitia Barbier and Wilder Duncan for Morbid Anatomy as a creative and pluridisciplinary exploration of the Curiosity Cabinet. The classes will focus on teaching ancient methods of specimen preparation that link science with art: students will create compositions involving natural elements and, according to their taste, will compose a traditional Victorian environment or a modern display. More on the series can be found here.

Wilder Duncan is an artist whose work puts a modern-day spin on the genre of Vanitas still life. Although formally trained as a realist painter at Wesleyan University, he has had a lifelong passion for, and interest in, natural history. Self-taught rogue taxidermist and professional specimen preparator, Wilder worked for several years at The Evolution Store creating, repairing, and restoring objects of natural historical interest such as taxidermy, fossils, seashells, minerals, insects, tribal sculptures, and articulated skeletons both animal and human. Wilder continues to do work for private collectors, giving a new life to old mounts, and new smiles to toothless skulls.

Laetitia Barbier is the head librarian at The Morbid Anatomy Library. She is working on a master's thesis for the Paris Sorbonne on painter Joe Coleman. She writes for Atlas Obscura and Morbid Anatomy.

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You can find out more about all of these events here, or sign up for them on Facebook by clicking here.

Photo of bat preparation by Laetitia Barbier.

Amazing Auction Alert: Bonhams "Objects of the Wunderkammer including an Exceptional Private Collection of European Ivories," London

Wow. Via Artdaily.org:

LONDON.- On Wednesday 2 November, to coincide with Halloween, Bonhams will hold its first sale dedicated to the Wunderkammer, also known as the ’Kunstkammer’ or ‘cabinet of curiosities’, a collection of fine objects created from the rarest and most exquisite materials and designed to induce excitement and wonder in the viewer.

Comprising works of art ranging from ivory figures and reliefs, early and rare bronzes, fine enamels, chalices and caskets, the Wunderkammer brought together objects produced from the most expensive and highly prized materials of the day, including ivory, tortoiseshell, rhino horn, enamel and gilt bronze.

This unique, one-off sale features one hundred and thirty ivory carvings, including a very spooky South German skull (estimate £10,000 – 15,000); an eerie 17th century anatomical model of an eye (estimate £4,000 – 6,000); and a gruesome relief depicting the martyrdom of Saint Erasmus (estimate £10,000 – 15,000). The top lot is a rare collection of forty four mid 18th century ivory intaglios of Roman Emperors, which has attracted a pre-sale estimate of £20,000 – 30,000. ...

You can read the full article on Artdaily.org by clicking here. You can find out more about the auction by clicking here.

Images of lots, top to bottom:
1) Lot No: 225
An 18th / 19th century North European carved and painted wood skull
possibly from a large crucifixion group, 14cm high

Estimate: £500 - 700, € 580 - 810

2) A rare South German anatomical model of an eye
probably late 17th century
composed of ten individual sections including an iris, pupil, and a section painted with veins, with a turned handle to the reverse and on a turned ivory spiralling stem and foot, together with a small 17th century circular carved wood and painted box which the eye fits into when disassembled, glass lense repaired, the ivory 8.5cm high, the box 8cm diameter (2)

Estimate: £6,000 - 8,000, € 6,900 - 9,200

Footnote:
The exquisite workmanship combined with the use of a rare and prized material in this miniature model of a human eye are typical of the objects that were collected and displayed in the Wunderkammer. Detailed models of eyes, as well as skulls and skeletons that are now associated with the Wunderkammer, were produced from the 17th century onwards and originally conceived as anatomical teaching tools. Ivory carvers such as Stephan Zick (1639-1715) and Johann Martin Teuber were influenced by the anatomical drawings of Andrea Vesalius in the mid 16th century and later George Bartisch who produced a manuscript relating to the eye in 1583. For a similar anatomical model of an eye, see Christies, London, December 4 2008, lot 75.

3) Lot No: 174Y
An 18th century South German ivory skull
carved with an entwined crown of thorns, with a snake above, later mounted on a perspex rectangular plinth, the ivory 10.5cm high

Estimate: £10,000 - 15,000, € 11,000 - 17,000

Footnote:
For a comparable ivory skull see the Robert and Angelique Noortman Collection: Paintings and Works of Art from Chateau De Groote Mot, sold at Sotheby's, Amsterdam, December 17, 2007, lot 557.
A similar skull monogrammed by Josef Konrad Wiser (1693-1760) but lacking the snake was sold at Sotheby's, London, July 9, 2008, lot 92, £37,250.

Wooden Anatomical Eve, "Anatomie des Vanités" Exhibition, Brussels, Belgium, 2008

An astounding wooden Anatomical Eve from an unnamed private collection, as featured in the "Anatomie des Vanités" exhibit at The Erasmus House in Brussels, Belgium in 2008.

An overview of the exhibition, from the museum flyer:

The exhibition includes animals, Narwhal tusks, an anatomical Eve, a whale's penis, 'vanities', turned ivories, testimony to the masters' virtuosity an of the taste for curiosities that could be found in the 'Wunderkammern' of the 16th and 17th centuries. These historic objects are contrasted with contemporary art (Jan fabre, Marie-Jo Lafontaine) and with paintings of this Museum (Jerome Bosh, Quentin Massys, Hans Holbein). The artist Aida Kazarian has helped redesign the layout of the Museum, on the 75th anniversary of the foundation of Erasmus House. The highlight of the exhibition is a pregnant anatomical Eve, coming from a private collection. This exhibition on vanity, though in jubilant fashion, shows many representations of death, at the confluence of the traditional 'memento mori' of the Middles Ages and the birth of scientific thought in the curiosity cabinets.

More about the exhibition here. More about Erasmus House here.

Inspired by Elettrogenica.

Modern/Contemporary Art and the Curiosity Cabinet, Conference, Seton Hall University, New Jersey, February 5th

For the curious (sic) among you: On Saturday, February 5th I will be presenting a short lecture as part of the very intriguing looking "Modern/Contemporary Art and the Curiosity Cabinet" conference hosted by Seton Hall University. Lawrence Weschler--author of one of my all time favorite books, Mr Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder--will be giving the keynote address on “A Natural History of Wonder;” my piece will examine the revival of private cabinets of curiosity as explored in my Private Cabinets photo series, from which the above images are drawn. I will also talk a bit about my own Private Cabinet experiment, The Morbid Anatomy Library.

This event is free and open to the public. Full line up and schedule follows; hope to see you there!

Modern/Contemporary Art and the Curiosity Cabinet

10-10:30: Coffee

10:30: Welcome (Petra ten-Doesschate Chu, Seton Hall University)

10:45-11:45: Lawrence Weschler, Keynote address: “A Natural History of Wonder.”

11:45-12:15: Kirsten A. Hoving, Middlebury College, “Thinking Inside the Box: Joseph Cornell’s Cabinets of Cosmic Curiosity.”

12:15-1:15: Lunch

1:15-1:45: Melissa Ragain, University of Virginia, “Wonder as a Way of Seeing: Gyorgy Kepes and the Center for Advanced Visual Studies

1:45-2:15: Matthew Palczynski, Philadelphia Museum of Art, “Organizing the Curious Damien Hirst”

2:15-2:45: Patricia Allmer, Manchester Metropolitan University (UK), and Jonathan Carson & Rosie Miller (artist collaborators), University of Salford (UK), “Playing in the Wunderkammer”

2:45-3: Break

3-3:30: Joanna Ebenstein, Morbid Anatomy Library, “To Every Man his Cabinet or The Morbid Anatomy Library and Cabinet and the Revival of Cabinets of Curiosity.”

3:30-4: Roundtable with artists, led by Jeanne Brasile, Seton Hall University

4-5:30: Reception

You can find out more here and get directions by clicking here. This symposium is being produced in conjunction with a new exhibition called Working in Wonder at the Walsh Gallery at Seton Hall University; You can find out more about that by clicking here.

All of the photos you see here are drawn from my Private Cabinets series; you can see the full collection by clicking here; the first two images are from the collection of Tim Knox and Todd Longstaffe-Gowan; the bottom image is from the collection Evan Michelson of Obscura Antiques (and also more recently the television show "Oddites.")

"The Children Sleep in the Cabinet of Curiosities"

Just stumbled upon this lovely image on the always fascinating Ullage Group website. The post, entitled "The Children Sleep in the Cabinet of Curiosities," explains:

...The sketch above is taken from Thackerayana, an 1875 compilation of the graphic work of William Makepeace Thackeray: cartoons, illustrations, travel sketches, marginal sketches. He made this one in the margin of “The Mirror,” a Scottish magazine from 1779. And here’s the passage that inspired it:

A wife is writing to the “Mirror” upon a new affliction which has attacked her husband. He happened to receive a crooked shilling in exchange for some of his goods (the husband was a grocer), and a virtuoso informed him that it was a coin of Alexander III, of great rarity and value, whereupon the good man became seized with a passion for collecting curiosities.

“His taste,” says the wife’s letter, “ranges from heaven above to the earth beneath, and to the waters under the earth. Every production of nature or of art, remarkable either for beauty or deformity, but particularly if either scarce or old, is now the subject of my husband’s avidity. The profits of our business, once considerable, but now daily diminishing, are expended, not only on coins, but on shells, lumps of different colored stones, dried butterflies, old pictures, ragged books, and worm-eaten parchments.

“Our house, which it was once my highest pleasure to keep in order, it would be now equally vain to attempt cleaning as the ark of Noah. The children’s bed is supplied by an Indian canoe; and the poor little creatures sleep three of them in a hammock, slung up to the roof between a stuffed crocodile and the skeleton of a calf with two heads. Even the commodities of our shop have been turned out to make room for trash and vermin. Kites, owls, and bats are perched upon the top of our shelves; and it was but yesterday that, putting my hand into a glass jar that used to contain pickles, I laid hold of a large tarantula in place of a mango.”

You can see the full post by clicking here. You can persuse the entire website by clicking here.

"Anatomie des Vanités" Exhibit, 2008

The Erasmus House in Brussels, Belgium is staging an amazing looking exhibition called "Anatomie des Vanités" that will be on view until September 16th. The exhibition celebrates the 75th anniversary of the creation of the Erasmus Museum and is organized around a 17th century anatomical Eve (see top photo above), belonging to an unspecified private collection. Modern artists such as Jan Fabre, Marie-Jo Lafontaine and Aïda Kazarian also take part in this project.

From the museum flyer:

The exhibition includes animals, Narwhal tusks, an anatomical Eve, a whale's penis, 'vanities', turned ivories, testimony to the masters' virtuosity an of the taste for curiosities that could be found in the 'Wunderkammern' of the 16th and 17th centuries. These historic objects are contrasted with contemporary art (Jan fabre, Marie-Jo Lafontaine) and with paintings of this Museum (Jerome Bosh, Quentin Massys, Hans Holbein). The artist Aida Kazarian has helped redesign the layout of the Museum, on the 75th anniversary of the foundation of Erasmus House. The highlight of the exhibition is a pregnant anatomical Eve, coming from a private collection. This exhibition on vanity, though in jubilant fashion, shows many representations of death, at the confluence of the traditional 'memento mori' of the Middles Ages and the birth of scientific thought in the curiosity cabinets.

All above images from the museum website; you can find out more about the exhibition there. You can also view a video of the installation here.