Anthropomorphic Insect Shadowbox Workshop with Former AMNH Senior Insect Preparator Daisy Tainton

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Anthropomorphic Insect Shadowbox by Daisy Tainton, teacher of today's workshop

With Daisy Tainton, Former Senior Insect Preparator at the American Museum of Natural History
Date: Saturday, March 24
Time: 1 - 4 PM
Admission: $65

*** MUST RSVP to morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com as class size is limited to 12
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Rhinoceros beetles: nature’s tiny giants. Adorable, with their giant heads and tiny legs, and wonderful antler-like protrusions. If you think they would be even more adorable drinking tiny beers and holding tiny fishing poles, we have the perfect class for you! In today’s workshop, students will learn to make-and leave with their own!-shadowbox dioramas featuring carefully positioned beetles doing nearly anything you can imagine. An assortment of miniature furniture and foods will be made available to decorate your habitat, but students are strongly encouraged to bring any dollhouse props they would like to use. 1:12 scale is generally 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?

The Moon and Its Closest Associates: A 3-D Slideshow with 3-D Legend Gerald Marks

"Moon Viewing," from the series "Artistic, Aesthetic and Poetic Tastes of the Japanese," by Gerald Marks, as featured in our current Lunation exhibition. Put on 3-D glasses for full experience.

Date: Friday, February 17
Time: 8:00
Admission: $5
Presented by Morbid Anatomy

The Moon and its relationship to our earth has been a prominent feature in the work of artist Gerald Marks for the past four decades. Tonight, join this 3-D legend and former San Francisco Exploratorium artist in residence for an all 3-D ode to our dear satellite. Some of the images premiered at Marks’ 2000 presentation at the American Museum of Natural history as part of their “Rockets in Sprockets” festival, honoring the first anniversary of the new Rose Center for Earth & Space. Also included will be Marks’ panoramic 3-D images of New York City, taken during the January 2001 Lunar Eclipse, from the top of the World Trade Center.

Gerald Marks is an artist working along the border of art and science, specializing in stereoscopic 3-D since 1973. He may be best known for the 3-D videos he directed for The Rolling Stones during their Steel Wheels tour. He has taught at The Cooper Union, The New School for Social Research, and the School of Visual Arts, where he currently teaches Stereoscopic 3-D within the MFA program in Computer Art. He was artist in residence at San Francisco’s Exploratorium and a Visiting Scholar at the MIT Media Lab, where he worked with computer-generated holography. His Professor Pulfrich’s Universe installations are popular features in museums all over the world, including the Exploratorium, The N. Y. Hall of Science, and Sony ExploraScience in Beijing & Tokyo. He has done 3-D consulting, lecturing & design for scientific purposes for The American Museum of Natural History, the National Institutes of Health, and Discover Magazine. He has created a large variety of 3-D artwork for advertising, display, and pharmaceutical use, as well as broadcast organizations Fox and MTV. He has designed award winning projections and sets at the N.Y. Public Theater, SOHO Rep, Kaatsbaan International Dance Center and the Nashville Ballet, where he created stereoscopically projected sets. He created the 3-D mural in the 28th Street station of the #6 train in New York City’s subway. He did 3-D imaging of dance around the New York shoreline as part of an iLAB grant from the iLAND Foundation for using the arts to raise environmental consciousness.

Dissection and Drawing Workshop with Real Anatomical Specimens

"Opossum forepaw anatomy," from a paper in the Journal of Anatomy and Physiology, 1879 called "The Intrinsic Muscles of the Marsupial Hand"

Dissection and drawing class with physical anthropologist Samuel Strong Dunlap, PhD
Date: Saturday, March 17
Time: 10:00 AM - 4:30 PM
Admission: $60

*** MUST RSVP to morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com as class size is limited to 10
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Modern scientific dissection and illustrations commenced in the Renaissance. Basic anatomical dissection, illustration and knowledge are still fundamental in many fields such as evolutionary biology, surgery, quality medical schools, and forensic science.

In today’s workshop, we will dissect and draw a Didelphis virginiana-the North American opossum-a “living fossil” whose anatomy has remained virtually unchanged over the past 70 million years; this creature is considered to be a good model for a basal-i.e. early or original-mammal. Many comparative skeletal materials will be available for examination and illustration, and additional specimens may also be available. Gloves, scalpels and probes will be provided. Marie Dauenheimer, medical illustrator (and instructor of tomorrow’s carbon dust workshop), will assist with this workshop.


Materials to bring with you to class:

  • Good quality drawing paper
  • Graphite pencils, HB, 2B
  • Colored pencils, emphasis on blue and brown shades
  • Erasers

Dr. Samuel Strong Dunlap is a physical anthropologist teaching and conducting research in the Washington, DC metropolitan area.  He specializes in human and primate musculoskeletal anatomy with the goal of clarifying evolutionary and development issues. Since completion of his PhD at Michigan State University he has worked and done research in forensic anthropology, human and primate anatomy and human evolution.  He has worked on human burial sites, forensic cases, with museum collections at Case Western Reserve University, the Smithsonian and Howard University Anatomy department. Archeology field experience included: an 18th century French fort in Indiana, a Mousterian site in Tuscany and a 100 square mile religious area in the Siskiyou Mountains of northern California. He recently gave a lecture at Observatory about his relative Charles Wilson Peale.


Carbon Dust Drawing Workshop, Featuring Real Anatomical Specimens

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Carbon dust drawing by instructor Marie Dauenheimer of an innominate bone (human) called the "nameless bone," commonly called the pelvic bone or hip bone.

Drawing class with Board Certified Medical Illustrator Marie Dauenheimer, MA, CMI
Date: Sunday, March 18

Time: 10:00 AM - 4:30 PM
Admission: $75 (includes materials cost)
*** MUST RSVP to morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com as class size is limited to 10
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Carbon dust is a technique perfected by medical artist Max Brodel, at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, in the late 19th century. This technique-which, until the digital age, was an essential component of medical illustration education-allows the artist to create luminous, textural, three-dimensional drawings by layering carbon dust on prepared paper.

Today’s one day intensive workshop will teach students the use of this all but forgotten medium, and guide each student in the creation of a finished work based on real anatomical specimens supplied by the instructor. The workshop will also include a historical lecture placing carbon dust drawings in the context of the history of anatomical and medical art. The instructor will provide all materials necessary for this workshop, and will also share finished carbon dust drawings (such as her depiction of the “nameless bone,” above) for study.

Marie Dauenheimer is a Board Certified Medical Illustrator working in the Washington, DC Metropolitan area. She specializes in creating medical illustrations and animations for educational materials, including posters, brochures, books, websites and interactive media. Since 1997 Marie has organized and led numerous “Art and Anatomy Tours” throughout Europe for the Vesalius Trust. Past tours have explored anatomical museums, rare book collections and dissection theatres in Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, France, Scotland and England. In addition to illustrating Marie teaches drawing, life drawing and human and animal anatomy at the Art Institute of Washington. Part of Marie’s anatomy class involves study and drawing from cadavers in the Gross Anatomy Lab at Howard University College of Medicine in Washington, DC.

Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

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Created by a student of Susan Jeiven's Anthropomorphic Mouse Taxidermy Class

The Morbid Anatomy Artist Academy
A series of classes and workshops instructing students in arcane, traditional, or anatomically related studio and conceptual art techniques.

Classes Thus Far

Proposals
If you are interested in proposing a class as part of this series, please email morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com.

Vanitas Drawing Class with Classically Trained Artist Lado Pochkhua

vanitas

Top image: Still-Life with a Skull, "Vanitas" by Philippe de Champaigne (1602–1674); Bottom image: Skeleton from the Morbid Anatomy Library who will be featured in our Vanitas compositions

Drawing class with Proteus Gowanus Artist in Residence Lado Pochkhua featuring real human skeleton
Date: 6 Mondays, January 9th through February 13th
(Jan. 9, Jan. 16, Jan. 23, Jan. 30, Feb. 6 & Feb. 13)
Time: 7:30-10:00 PM
Admission: $110 (classes can also be taken individually on a drop-in basis for $20 per class)
*** This class has a 10 person size limit; Please RSVP for full course at morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Vanitas is a genre of still-life painting that flourished in the Netherlands in the early 17th century. A vanitas painting contains collections of objects symbolic of the inevitability of death and the transience and vanity of earthly achievements and pleasures, exhorting the viewer to consider mortality and to repent.

In this class, Lado Pochkhua, an accomplished classically trained artist (see following bio) from Eastern Europe and artist in residence at our sister space Proteus Gowanus will, using a variety of artifacts drawn from The Morbid Anatomy Library, teach students to create and draw their own “vanitas” compositions. The main star of said Vanitas composition will be the genuine human skeleton recently donated to the library, which you can see in the bottom photograph.

The ultimate goal of the class will be not only the creation of this particular drawing, but also understanding of the principles of classical drawing. The instructor will also share historical images throughout the course.

No previous drawing experience necessary; all levels are welcome!

MATERIALS
Please bring with you to class:

  • One drawing pad at least 18″ X 20″ with a firm back; paper Fabriano or Arches, or Strathmore 400
  • Pencil: HB, 2B, 4B, simple graphite pencils, (no charcoal !!!)
  • Eraser

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR
Lado Pochkhua
was born in Sukhumi, Georgia in 1970. He received his MFA in Painting and Printmaking from Tbilisi State Art Academy in Georgia in 2001. He currently divides his time between New York and Tbilisi, Georgia.

Selected Exhibitions:

  • 2011   “Works from the Creamer Street Studio,” at the Literature Museum, Tbilisi Georgia  (solo show)
  • 2010    “Paradise ” at Proteus Gowanus, New York
  • 2009    “Prague Biennale 4,” Georgian pavilion
  • 2009    “The Art of returning Home,” Arsi Gallery, Tbilisi Georgia (solo show)
  • 2008    Gardens, Ships, and Lessons, K. Petrys Ház Gallery, Budapest, Hungary (solo show) Exhibition of Georgian Artists, Festival OFF EUROPA ditorei Gallerie NBL, Leipzig, Germany
  • 2004    Artists of Georgia, Georgian Embassy, London, UK
  • 2003    Curriculum Vitae: a retrospective of 20th century Georgian art, Caravasla Tbilisi History Museum, Tbilisi, Georgia, Waiting for the Barbarians, Gallery Club 22, Tbilisi, Georgia (solo show)
  • 2001     21 Georgian Artists, UNESCO, Paris, France
  • 1998    Magical Geometry, TMS Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia (solo show)

Para-Academia #6: I Are Cyborg: Cyberstuff, Design, and the Great Body Remix

iarecyborg1A multimedia talk on the fiction of cyborgs with artist Ethan Gould
Date: Thursday, December 8
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: FREE! But we ask a suggested donation of $5 to help us keep Observatory’s doors open
Presented by the Hollow Earth Society and The Public School New York

[TARGET AQUIRED] {BEGIN CHARMING DESCRIPTION} >#2355> Artist Ethan Gould presents a multimedia talk on the wide-ranging design ethos of the classic science fiction trope, the CYBORG: a fictional and widely disseminated pop-melding of mechanics and human biology whose quiet shadow, the field of cybernetics, has totally transformed our world and ourselves.

The birth and weird intersections of these two ideas and their super-strong, steel-crushing grip on culture is explored in art, fiction, science, movies, and popular design, interspersed with excerpts from a lifetime of the artist’s own work, some of it dating back to elementary school and quite embarrassing!

These piles of entertaining data are used to launch much larger questions: We set out on a line of inquiry debating the separations between fiction and fact, language and object, and the sheepish nightmares and hopeful possibilities that accompany a body-as-bricolage, merged with streams of data, capable of great and terrible feats.

Class readinghttp://observatoryroom.org/files/2011/11/cyborgcourse.pdf

Ethan Gould is an artist, curator, and writer living in Brooklyn, NY. After graduating from the University of Rochester with a double degree in English and film studies and a concentration in brain and cognitive sciences, he obviously immediately began working as a puppeteer. Since then he has worked as museum program developer and illustrator and is currently a fine artist.

He is the co-founder of the Hollow Earth Society and a member of Observatory. With the Society, he has co-created the Suspicious… series of books including Suspicious Anatomy and Suspicious Zoology. With fellow HES co-founder Wythe Marschall, he will be the artist-in-residence at Elsewhere in April, 2012. He is currently working a corpus of retrobiomorphic head multimedia, which seems about right.

***

The Para-Academia & Theory Fiction Series
Ongoing workshops co-produced by the Public School New York and the Hollow Earth Society

A Shadow Genealogy of the Ivory Tower/Producing the Unwriteable

The para is the “alongside,” that which comments on the official or normative. While academics debate the finer points of Shakespeare and Kant, para-academics aggregate around shadow-commentators whose works do not so much categorize (striate) and enlighten (bring light into) difficult terrain, but produce that terrain, creating obscure spaces and nebulous discourses that are immune to traditional academic approaches.

Blogs, speculative medievalisms, Cyclonopedia, Charles Fort, teratology, Deleuzean-everything, print-on-demand—these and other tentacles of a polycephalic (many-headed) para-academia have entwined to produce an addendum and, finally, an ultimatum to established disciplines and practices.

We will explore these emerging ideas and modes of expression through a series of discussions and writing workshops, with audio available after each session.

Anthropomorphic Mouse Taxidermy Class with Susan Jeiven: Back by Popular Demand

generalDate 1: Monday, December 12 (SOLD OUT)
Date 2: Tuesday, January 10 (SOLD OUT)
Date 3: Tuesday, January 24
(SOLD OUT)
Date 4: Tuesday, February 14 (special Valentine’s Day theme) (SOLD OUT)
Date 5: Tuesday, February 21 (SOLD OUT)
Time: 7 PM-11 PM
Admission: $60
Presented by Morbid Anatomy
***All sold out; send email to
morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com to be added to mailing list
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Anthropomorphic taxidermy-the practice of mounting and displaying taxidermied animals as if they were humans or engaged in human activities-was a popular art form during the Victorian and Edwardian eras. The best known practitioner of the art form is British taxidermist Walter Potter who displayed his pieces-which included such elaborate tableaux as The Death of Cock Robin, The Kitten Wedding, and The Kitten Tea Party-in his own museum of curiosities.

On Tuesday November 29th, please join Morbid Anatomy and taxidermist, tattoo artist and educator Susan Jeiven for a beginners class in anthropomorphic taxidermy. All materials-including a mouse for each student-will be provided, and each class member will leave at the end of the day with their own anthropomorphic taxidermied mouse. Students are invited to bring any miniature items with which they might like to dress or decorate their new friend; some props and miniature clothing will also be provided by the teacher. A wide variety of sizes and colors of mice will be available.

No former taxidermy experience is required.

Also, some technical notes:

  • We use NO harsh or dangerous chemicals.
  • Everyone will be provided with gloves.
  • All animals are disease free.
  • Although there will not be a lot of blood or gore, a strong constitution is necessary; taxidermy is not for everyone.
  • All animals were already dead, nothing was killed for this class. All mice used are feeder animals for snakes and lizards and would literally be discarded if not sold.
  • Please do not bring any dead animals with you to the class

You can contact Sue with any more questions by clicking here.

Anthropomorphic Chick Taxidermy Class with Susan Jeiven

taxidermyclassdec20_smallDate: Tuesday, December 20th
Time: 7 PM-11 PM
Admission: $60
Presented by Morbid Anatomy
***Sold out; email
morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com to be added to wait list
This class is part of the Morbid Anatomy Art Academy

Anthropomorphic taxidermy-the practice of mounting and displaying taxidermied animals as if they were humans or engaged in human activities-was a popular art form during the Victorian and Edwardian eras. The best known practitioner of the art form is British taxidermist Walter Potter who displayed his pieces-which included such elaborate tableaux as The Death of Cock Robin, The Kitten Wedding, and The Kitten Tea Party-in his own museum of curiosities.

On Tuesday December 20-the first night of Hanukkah!-please join Morbid Anatomy and taxidermist, tattoo artist and educator Susan Jeiven for a beginners class in anthropomorphic chick taxidermy with a special holiday theme. All materials-including a chick for each student-will be provided, and each class member will leave at the end of the day with their own anthropomorphic taxidermied chick. Students are invited to bring any miniature items with which they might like to dress or decorate their new friend; some props and miniature clothing will also be provided by the teacher.

No former taxidermy experience is required.

Also, some technical notes:

  • We use NO harsh or dangerous chemicals.
  • Everyone will be provided with gloves.
  • All animals are disease free.
  • Although there will not be a lot of blood or gore, a strong constitution is necessary; taxidermy is not for everyone.
  • All animals were already dead, nothing was killed for this class.
  • Please do not bring any dead animals with you to the class

You can contact Sue with any more questions by clicking here.

CLASS: Dissection as Studio Practice

toolsLecture and Studio Art Class with artist Laura Splan
Date: Sunday, January 8th
Time: 1-4 PM
Fee: $60
*** Class size is limited to 20; please RSVP to morbidanatomy[at]gmail.com

This class will survey the use of dissection in contemporary art practice through an illustrated lecture, discussion and collaborative art project. We will examine the conceptual and cultural significance of cutting, excavating, disassembling, labeling, observing and displaying “bodies.” The lecture will present a brief history of dissection as well as work by contemporary artists exploring imagery, tropes and methods of dissection. The collaborative project will be a fun and lively hands on exploration of the meaning of dissection in a work of art. Participants should bring an object, artifact or specimen to “dissect” for the group exercise. Additional supplies, tools and materials will be provided. No prior art training is required.

Laura Splan is a Brooklyn based visual artist. Her mixed media work explores historical and cultural ambivalence towards the human body. She was recently a Visiting Lecturer at Stanford University where she taught “Art and Biology” in the Art & Art History Department. She has been a Visiting Artist at the New York Academy of Sciences, California College of Art, San Francisco Art Institute, Maryland Institute College of Art, and Cal Arts.  She curates the visual portal DomesticatedViscera.com. Images of her artwork can be found on her website: LauraSplan.com.

You can contact Laura through her website with any questions about the class by clicking here.