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Dead Bodies On Display At Atrium Mall

By Jonathan Elias, WBZ-TV

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(credit: CBS)

(credit: CBS)

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Reporting Jonathan Elias

CHESTNUT HILL (CBS) — At the Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill you can find holiday decorations hung, decorated Christmas trees and cadavers.  Yes, dead bodies. 

A new exhibit opens Saturday where the Abercrombie and Fitch store used to be.

Bodies Human, Anatomy in Motion is the name of the exhibit.  13 full bodies and 100 body parts from real humans will be on display. 

“The goal of exhibit like this is to learn,” says exhibit director Tom Mulholland. 

These kinds of displays have been shown in museums and stand along store fronts, but how did it wind up next door to a Pottery Barn for Kids in a mall? 

“It’s very popular for a mall to support an exhibit like this because it has space foot traffic and everyone knows where it’s at.” 

Heading into the busiest shopping season of the year lots of people will see this exhibit, and on the eve of its opening Aaron Leiberman, out shopping with his two girls, was caught off guard. 

“It is out of place a little bit. It’s typically in a museum or another venue,” says Leiberman. 

One young shopper saw the display and said, “Probably not a mall. That’s kind of awkward, like a body in the mall kind of weird.”

Mulholland admits this exhibit might not be for everyone, but the majority of the people who come through leave fascinated, he says. 

“There’s thousands and thousands and hundreds of thousands of people similar to this and love it and there are a few hundred against it. That’s okay. Everyone has the right to their opinion,” says Mulholland, who was putting on the finishing touches before the exhibit opens.

Doors open on Anatomy in Motion Saturday November 13 and runs through the end of March.

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  • Chuck D

    Unfortunately, this appears to be the display that was so controversial. Supposedly, the “participants” did not give permission to have the procedure (plastination?) done to them, and then to be displayed. Unlike the show at the Museum Of Science a couple of years ago where every body was “approved” for treatment and display.

  • Cynic

    No one wants to Die.

  • sara

    why would someone do that? its gross, no one wants to see that… ew

  • Ellen

    Belongs in a museum not a shopping mall. Gross as gross can get.

  • TiaMaria

    ew…it is gross to see this at at shopping mall… miss cn , ….robi.p and d?

  • BARBARA

    “THERE’S THOUSANDS”, ETC., IS INCORRECT. MR. MULHOLLAND SHOULD HAVE SAID, “THERE ARE THOUSANDS.” SIMILARLY, “EVERYONE KNOWS WHERE IT’S AT”, IS INCORRECT. “EVERYONE KNOW WHERE IT IS” IS CORRECT. WE ARE A NATION THAT DOES NOT WANT TO LEARN, NOT THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, OR ANYTHING EDUCATIONAL. I THINK THE EXHIBIT IS A GREAT IDEA. MY ONLY OBJECTION IS THE MALL. I THINK MALLS ARE GROSS. THANK YOU.

    • Cynic

      Barbara…Remember when most people in the media were English Majors? Times have changed.

  • Barry

    There is speculattion that these exhibits are political prisioners so besides being gross these exhibits weren’t prepared voluteeringly.

  • mikey

    No thanks, I’ll pass on this one. I also won’t be shopping there. Thanks for the warning.

  • Jonathan

    I won’t be shopping there in the foreseeable future.

  • Ellen

    Could you please take this off your web site, It’s depressing to look at, and old news to boot.

  • Pat

    I don’t object to the exhibit. I object to the location. I don’t go to malls very often but when I do, I would not want to see this exhibit.

  • Cynic

    I’ve often wondered whatever happened to all my High School buddies….Now I know.

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