Gunther von Hagens

Gunther von Hagens (born Gunther Gerhard Liebchen) is a German artist and scientist born on January 10, 1945 in Alt-Skalden, near Kalisz, Poland., then part of Germany.

At age 21, he was a member of the Communist Party of the former German Democratic Republic until his imprisonment for participating in the 1968 protests. Three years earlier, he studied medicine at the University of Jena. Later he emigrated as a refugee to the Federal Republic of Germany, in Heidelberg to continue his medical studies.

Around 1977, he assumed the position of scientific collaborator of the Institute of Anatomy and Biology of this city, where he carried out several chemical experiments to later create the process of Plastination, in which water a body with cold acetone and then replace it with a hardening plastic solution. For this process he required very complex studies until he plastinated his first human body in 1990.

In 1993, he created the Heidelberg Plastination Institute and thirteen years before, the company BIODUR for the creation and distribution of devices designed for plastination. His bodies prepared with this method cause astonishment and controversy in today's world. He toured several countries around the world, making plastination known. He is currently building the Plastination City in Dalian, China.^{[citation needed]}

His work constitutes a contribution to art and medicine, by revealing the human body presumably as it is, sensitizing those interested in observing his work, a better understanding of health and anatomy (a work that has not been free of controversies by the most conservative sectors). He also plastinated animals such as dogs and some marine mammals. But he is not the only one in which he illustrates the body: Leonardo da Vinci and Andrés Vesalio, among others, gave their contributions and knowledge of human anatomy through the scientific history of humanity. That is why Von Hagens wants his work to be valued by everyone without causing repulsion when knowing what the body is like. So far more than twenty-five million people have seen his exhibition work.

In 2005 he developed a 4-episode program for "Channel 4" from Great Britain called "Anatomy For Beginners" (anatomy for beginners), for purely educational purposes.

He recently collaborated with the artist Lady Gaga to exhibit her art at some of her concerts.