It was a powerful display of muscle for the Denver Museum of Nature & Science that drew more than 675,000 people. And it’s over at midnight.
“Body Worlds 2,” the museum’s third-most-popular exhibit ever, is a strange spectacle – real human cadavers, chopped, exposed and posed, vacantly stare back at visitors. A special plastic encases and preserves everything from muscles to nerves.
Near the entrance on Saturday afternoon, Gary Topping, 54, stared at one of the donated bodies.
“This is like a high school biology class,” the Colorado Springs resident said, “but lots better.”
The event’s last weekend sold out early, and awestruck visitors have crammed the floor at all hours of day and night since 7 a.m. Friday.
By the time the last guest leaves tonight, it will have been open for 65 hours nonstop, serving 37,000 in its last weekend, museum officials said. It’s the third-most-popular exhibit in the museum’s 105-year history. In 1988, the Ramses exhibit drew 909,000 visitors, and the Aztec exhibit in 1993 drew 712,000.
Bridget Coughlin, the museum’s curator for human health, said the exhibit’s novelty and appeal drew the crowds. She said Denver’s health-conscious culture probably added to the interest.
Vicky Gershuny, 14, of Longmont and her 13-year old brother, Gosha, stared through glass at chunks of human heart.
A sign described what went wrong with the organ’s former owner.
“Fat and stuff clogs the pipey thing,” Vicky explained to her brother.
Though at times ghoulish, the exhibit isn’t closed to children, but the museum recommends they be older than 10.
The display was created using a plastinization technique developed by German anatomist Gunther von Hagens. Each complete body takes an anatomist working 40-hour weeks as long as a full year to prepare, Coughlin said.
“It’s wonderful,” said Ron Hert, 65, of Fort Collins. “It gives me some insight into all the things I’ve torn, ripped and broken over the years.”
Aptly named, Hert boasts he’s delved into three sports and has a broken bone to show for each. The former smoker also browsed the exhibit for preserved lungs of cigarette puffers, dark gray, next to their whitish nonsmoker counterparts.
He reflected on his old black-and- white anatomy textbooks and concluded that kids nowadays have an advantage.
“It’s got to have a profound difference on the way they look at their bodies and their health,” he said. “It’s an extraordinary opportunity to plan a better life for themselves.”
“But,” he lamented, “it’s a little late for me.”
Staff writer Brandon Lowrey can be reached at 303-820-1201 or blowrey@denverpost.com.
