The Wellcome collection

As mentioned yesterday I went to the Wellcome collection on Thursday, it was primarily to see the temporary exhibit about the brain- 'mind as matter' which I had read about in a magazine. The Wellcome collection is 'a free visitor destination for the incurably curious' I liked that phrase so much I renamed my blog after it!
This exhibition was fascinating and covered a lot of topic from the old fascination with measuring intellect in brain size to modern day brain surgery. There were many different displays which I loved but I had 2 favourites. There was this amazing video of bloodflow to different regions of an individuals brain, by brain scan whilst he was listening to some music, you could listen to the music and it really does demonstrate how music can affect brain functioning, with there being sudden bursts of red (signifying high levels of blood flow) as the music climaxes. There was also photos and testimonies of several different people who planned to donate their brains to medical science and research, it was weirdly peaceful to hear their motives to donate and it did make me stop for a minute and think about the end of life, to me it seems daunting and distant but to read such objective accounts makes me think that it is not so terrifying and that good (furthering of knowledge of brains) can come out of the worst events.
Upstairs there were two more exhibitions, Medicine man and Medicine now. Medicine man is a selection of artefacts collected by Sir Henry Wellcome and contains all manner of items, some unusual, such as napoleon's toothbrush or a mourning hair brooch, but all really interesting. There was an audio tour and after trying to use it and discarding it as useless, i tried again and heard a very easy to follow commentary on certain objects.
Medicine now fast forwarded everything into the present, the clue was in the name. This contained many pieces of artwork centric on medicine and the human body. There was a terrifying piece which mechanically opened and shut an eye at long intervals, just when you were not expecting it! I'm embarrassed to admit I did scream... At the end there was a large wall full of visitors artwork on particular topics, I chose sleep, I thought this was nice as it allowed everyone to leave their marks (until they get replaced by the next people, that is).
I highly recommend visiting this collection as it would be interesting for all ages and as a plus, It's completely free! We spent a long time in the Wellcome collection, more than we had anticipated, probably due to me getting encapsulated in every artefact and struggling to more on quickly. We had to rush our dinner, not desirable... ;)