A Voyage through the Human Body
author: Christian Möller
ARCHIMEDIA Linz
title: A Voyage through the Human Body (?)
date of creation: 1996
medium: Motorized video projector and screen on a large rail mounted above eye-level. Laser-disc player as an image source.
description of work: The data which became well known to the public as the "digitized prisoner" is shown on a motorized projection, scanning the body of the former prisoner as it transverses the Kunsthalle on its way on the rail. The prisoner, Joseph Paul Jerningan, who has been executed on August 5th in 1993, has been physically sawn into 1mm-slices, which then have been digitized and stored on a computer at the Health and Science Center in Denver/ Colorado. In the exhibition these "slices" serve as the visual material for a voyage through the human body.
Proportional to the position of the projection setup in the Kunsthalle the screen shows a scan of the body of the analyzed person, starting at the top of the skull and moving down to the toes.
exhibition setup: A large rail is mounted above eye-level, which carries a motorized projector and screen and reports the position of the screen to a computer with attached laser-disc player feeding the images to the video projector.
additional documentation: Website containing the prisoner's scanned body
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/extramural_research.dir/visible_human.html
the fresh and the frozen cadaver (b/w)
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/extramural_research.dir/visible_gallery.html
color photographs
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/extramural_research.dir/photos.html