My friend (and post-grad professor at the University of Winchester in England) Dr. Christina Welch is attempting to revive a Late-Medieval Memento Mori. A 200 year old tree has recently fallen at a local arboretum that Christina has ear-marked should she get the money.  Christina is half way there and if she gets more than the £2,000 ($2392.00) we need then the extra will go to the cost of text boards and transporting Guy from Eleanor’s workshop to wherever opts to have it as an exhibition.
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Carved cadaver memorials are a specific form of late-medieval monument. Often called a transi which means passed over in French, these unusual memorials images the deceased naked, emaciated and usually lying in an open burial shroud with a strategically placed hand to protect their modesty.

Carved cadaver memorials only appear north of the Alps and in the Uk there are only 41; 38 in England and 3 in Wales. They date from c1420s to 1588 and are connected to Roman catholic after-life beliefs as well as acting as a Memento Mori. Most are full size, all bar one are of males, and the equivalent cost of this memorial is around the price of a top of the range Ferrari today; they might have imaged the individual in a state of humility but they were a status symbol as memorials go and only affordable by wealthy land-owners and high ranking clerics – none of whom would have died in a state of anorexia!

The Carving Guy project is a unique opportunity for people to help fund the creation of a new transi. It will be hand carved from a single price of English wood by Eleanor Crook, a world-leading anatomical sculptor. It is probably the first time in around 500 years that such a carving has been attempted and once done it will form the basis of an international conference and a touring museum exhibition.

The project needs to raise £2000 to purchase the wood and have it transported to Eleanor’s’ workshop. When it is finished it will be over 6 foot in length and will be a modern interpretation of this form of unusual memorial. It will be anatomically accurate , as many of the originals were (quite something when you consider the first was carved around 90 years before the famous anatomist, Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564) was born. The project is led by Dr Christina Welch of the University of Winchester, who lectures in Religion, and Death Studies. She has a web site on the English carved cadaver memorials http://carvedcadavers.wix.com/eccm and is currently tweeting photographs of the carved cadavers @ChristinaAWelch.

There is more information on carved cadavers on the Crowdfunding site including a short video the project from Christina and Eleanor. People can pledge anything from £5 and there are a number of incentives for those who donate to the project from a virtual hug and heartfelt thanks, to giclee prints of the preparatory drawings and a special thanks in any accompanying literature, such as exhibition text boards and leaflets, and the book By Christina that is to be published on carved cadavers.

The project can be accessed here http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/guy-the-gaunt

 

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