Animal Inside Out

No, it isn't an exhibit from the Damien Hirst retrospective at Tate Passé. It's much more sophisticated, scientific, educational and artistic than that. It isn't merely a stuffed shark, but the blood vessels of a porbeagle shark that has had its skin removed and a coloured liquid resin injected into the main arterial network. When the tissue is removed, the network of blood vessels is revealed. It's one of the exhibits in the latest exhibition at the Natural History Museum in London: Animal Inside Out, which opens on 6 April and runs till 16 September (title link). The show includes nearly 100 plastinated animals and capillary specimens displaying their intricate insides - goats, giraffes, ostriches, elephants and so on - all created by the team behind Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds shows. If you're the fond parent of a budding sadist, this will keep the evil cherub happy for hours. You'll find the show in the Waterhouse Gallery, admission £9 adults or £6 silver surfers and evil cherubs. CLICK for a BBC video.