KEAGAN ANFUSO

Collector of nouns.

[keagananfuso]

Forest Haven Asylum Laurel, Maryland Darryl Moran Photography : https://www.flickr.com/photos/dwmoran/10055547026/in/set-72157636120823025/ "Opened in 1925, Forest Haven was initially a beacon of progress and quality in treating children who were mentally ill, handicapped, or otherwise unable to function normally in society. With over 30 structures on the 250-acre campus, the inmates were taught job skills in a communal farm colony environment that provided them with essential training and an emotionally empowering sense of community. "

"By the 1960s funding for the sprawling institution began to dry up and devastating cut backs began to afflict the asylum. Recreational programs were discontinued, and the staff was reduced and replaced with unqualified employees. As the years rolled by things got progressively worse as the doctors, nurse, and caregivers began taking out their frustrations on the patients many of whom were abused bodily and sexually, if they were given any attention at all. Eventually patients began dying of neglect and its related causes. The dead would be passed through the basement morgue and eventually buried in an unmarked field nearby. Hundreds of inmates died, and according to one report, some were even the subject of medical experiments before the entire institution was shuttered in 1991." - Eric Grundhauser, Atlas Obscura

[keagananfuso]

Mary Mallon "Typhoid Mary" 1869-1938 Mary Mallon, better known as Typhoid Mary, was the first person in the United States identified as an asymptomatic carrier of the pathogen associated with typhoid fever. She was presumed to have infected 53 people, three of whom died, over the course of her career as a cook. She was twice forcibly isolated by public health authorities and died after a total of nearly three decades in isolation on North Brother "Quarantine" Island. "I had my first talk with Mary in the kitchen of this house. . . . I was as diplomatic as possible, but I had to say I suspected her of making people sick and that I wanted specimens of her urine, feces and blood. It did not take Mary long to react to this suggestion. She seized a carving fork and advanced in my direction. I passed rapidly down the long narrow hall, through the tall iron gate, . . . and so to the sidewalk. I felt rather lucky to escape." - George Soper, Civil Engineer who attempted to stop Typhoid Fever Outbreaks in the early 1900's "This contention that I am a perpetual menace in the spread of typhoid germs is not true. My own doctors say I have no typhoid germs. I am an innocent human being. I have committed no crime and I am treated like an outcast -- a criminal. It is unjust, outrageous, uncivilized. It seems incredible that in a Christian community a defenseless woman can be treated in this manner." - Mary Mallon

[keagananfuso]

The Lowline Prototype Exhibition Williamsburg Trolley Terminal // New York City Photograph : Bit Boy // Flickr

"The proposal to reappropriate the 1.5 acre Williamsburg trolley terminal to create the world's first underground park was made public in 2011, and has received tremendous media coverage and both official and popular support, including a record-breaking Kickstarter that raised more than $155k from 3,300 donors. The trolley terminal, which was built in 1903 and abandoned since 1948, runs for three blocks under Delancey Street on the Lower East Side. The park will be lit and powered by a combination of LEDs and a new kind of fiber-optic technology called a "remote skylight," which, in addition to pulling enough sun from street level to light the park, is also strong enough for photosynthesis, enabling plants to grown beneath the ground." - Oriana Leckert, ATLAS OBSCURA

[keagananfuso]

The Female Atlas Sculpture 18ft Concrete  Sculpture Artist Jason deCaires Taylor New Providence, Bahamas “This Atlas is about our younger generations supporting our oceans, stopping them from collapsing."  Jason deCaires Taylor

[humansofnewyork]

"I take my meds but I still have bad days. I know the moment I wake up if it’s going to be a bad day. I’m really fidgety and distracted and resentful. I can’t even sit out here on bad days. I get too resentful when people walk by and don’t help. I know it doesn’t make sense, and that I don’t have a right to be resentful, but I still get angry. I can’t keep a job because of the bad days. I just get too verbal when I’m agitated. I don’t even realize I’m doing it. I realize it later. But when it’s happening, I don’t know it’s happening. It’s like when I’m in the picture, I can’t see the picture."

[weirdvintage]

Mortado, The Human Fountain was born in Berlin and first exhibited himself there in 1929.  He had holes bored through both his hands and feet, and, when seated in a specially constructed chair, copper tubes were fed through the wounds.   Water flowed through them at a high pressure, making Mortado a “human fountain”.  

When he was not performing, he plugged his wounds with corks to keep them from healing.  He occasionally also performed in biblical Crucifixion reenactments, placing small “blood bags” in his wounds for realism, which his assistant would puncture when he nailed him.  

He is pictured here at Coney Island’s Dreamland Circus in 1930 (Sources 1, 2)

[keagananfuso]

Alena Beljakova Russian Photographer Alena is currently 19 years old.  This is her portfolio. https://www.flickr.com/photos/39852223@N04/sets/72157627104761184/

[vicemag]

[keagananfuso]

 Indonesian regency of Tana Toraja on the island of Sulawesi  "Tomb Sweeping" Ritual 2014

"Depending on the village, every one to five years, families reunite to exhume the bodies of their deceased relatives, clean up the inside of their coffins, and, if the mummified bodies are in solid enough condition, give their ancestors a fresh change of clothes. " - Marc Ressang, VICE Magazine

[keagananfuso]

Mass Suicide at Jonestown Guyana November 18, 1978

In 1978, a group of former Temple members and concerned relatives of current members convinced U.S. Congressman Leo Ryan, a Democrat of California, to travel to Jonestown and investigate the settlement. On November 17, 1978, Ryan arrived in Jonestown with a group of journalists and other observers. At first the visit went well, but the next day, as Ryan's delegation was about to leave, several Jonestown residents approached the group and asked them for passage out of Guyana. Jones became distressed at the defection of his followers, and one of Jones' lieutenants attacked Ryan with a knife. The congressman escaped from the incident unharmed, but Jones then ordered Ryan and his companions ambushed and killed at the airstrip as they attempted to leave. The congressman and four others were murdered as they boarded their charter planes.

Back in Jonestown, Jones commanded everyone to gather in the main pavilion and commit what he termed a "revolutionary act." The youngest members of the Peoples Temple were the first to die, as parents and nurses used syringes to drop a potent mix of cyanide, sedatives and powdered fruit juice into children's throats. Adults then lined up to drink the poison-laced concoction while armed guards surrounded the pavilion.

When Guyanese officials arrived at the Jonestown compound the next day, they found it carpeted with hundreds of bodies. Many people had perished with their arms around each other. 

[keagananfuso]

"Lonesome George" Posthumous Display  Pinta Island Giant Tortoise  American Museum of Natural History : New York City Arguably the world's most famous tortoise, Lonesome George was the last known member of his species. It's believed there were between 14-15 giant tortoise sub-species on the Galapagos where Lonesome George was discovered before human arrival destroyed their food supply of available flora and also resulted in the tortoises being killed to feed ship crews forcing the species to extinction.  Lonesome George was found in 1971 and lived at the Galapagos Islands center until he died on June 24, 2012 at an age estimated to be over 100 years old. 

[keagananfuso]

Joseph Carey Merrick  "The Elephant Man" 1862-1890 "he was found dead in his bed…He was lying on his back as if asleep, and had evidently died suddenly and without struggle. The method of his death was peculiar. So large and heavy was his head that he could not sleep lying down. The attitude he was compelled to assume when he slept was very strange. He sat up in bed with his back supported by pillows, his knees were drawn up, and his arms clasped round his legs, while his head rested on the points of his bent knees. He often said to me that he wished he could lie down to sleep 'like other people'. I think on this last night he must, with some determination, have made the experiment. The pillow was soft, and the head, when placed on it, must have fallen backwards and caused a dislocation of the neck. Thus it came about that his death was due to the desire that had dominated his life - to be 'like other people'." - From the diary of Dr. Frederick Treves

[keagananfuso]

Benjamin the Tasmanian Tiger (Thylacine) The last known thylacine photographed at Beaumaris Zoo in 1933. The Thylacine became extinct on the Australian mainland not less than 2000 years ago. Its decline and extinction in Tasmania was probably hastened by the introduction of dogs, but appears mainly due to direct human persecution as an alleged pest.

[keagananfuso]

Lewis Wickes Hine American Sociologist / Photographer 1874-1940 Hine used his camera as a tool for social reform. His photographs were instrumental in changing the child labor laws in the United States. For nearly ten years Hine was the photographer for the National Child Labor Committee, contributing to exhibitions and the organization's publication, The Survey. Declaring that he "wanted to show things that had to be corrected," he was one of the earliest photographers to use the photograph as a documentary tool.

[keagananfuso]

Maybe each human being lives in a unique world, a private world different from those inhabited and experienced by all other humans. . . If reality differs from person to person, can we speak of reality singular, or shouldn't we really be talking about plural realities? And if there are plural realities, are some more true (more real) than others? What about the world of a schizophrenic? Maybe it's as real as our world. Maybe we cannot say that we are in touch with reality and he is not, but should instead say, His reality is so different from ours that he can't explain his to us, and we can't explain ours to him. The problem, then, is that if subjective worlds are experienced too differently, there occurs a breakdown in communication ... and there is the real illness.

Philip K. Dick  American Science Fiction Writer / Philosopher  1928-1982

[keagananfuso]

ERIS THE GODDESS OF DISCORD

One day they [Polytekhnos and Aedon of Kolophon in Lydia] blurted out the needless remark that they loved each other more than did Hera and Zeus. Hera found what was said to be insupportable and sent Eris (Discord) between them to create strife in their activities. Polytekhnos (Polytechnus) was on the point of finishing off a standing board for a chariot and Aedon of completing the web she was weaving. They agreed that whoever of the two would finish the task more quickly would hand over a female servant to the other.

Aedon was the quicker in finishing off her web--Hera had helped her in the task. Polytekhnos was infuriated by the victory of Aedon [and fetched Aedon's sister Khelidon, raped her and brought her back disguised as a slave for his wife. The pair on discovering each other's identities murdered Polytekhnos' son and fed him to his father: the gods then transformed them all into birds].

[keagananfuso]

ZEB BLACKWELL : SOLOPSIST INTERVIEW

Q: Why do you not believe that other people’s minds exist? A: It’s quite simple, really. I can be quite certain of my own existence – it’s the whole “I think, therefore I am” thing. But as for the existence of other minds, well, that’s a much trickier thing to prove. I can see that there are these funny-looking things that walk around and talk to me and generally do things that would indicate that they have minds like me, but I can’t really be sure. There’s nothing to distinguish my econ professor, for instance, from a robot that could pass the Turing test. Just because people act like they have minds doesn’t mean that they aren’t basically just machines responding to stimuli.

Q: But can’t you look in someone’s eyes when they’re hurting and see that they really feel that pain? A: Furbies could make some pretty convincing displays of pain. People are just really complex Furbies.

[keagananfuso]

Being half of more complete, single entities, humans suffer inherent and deep complications. On one hand, we strive for progress, perfection, knowledge, enlightenment, salvation, isolation and self-perpetuation, even immortality. We seek to be whole beings, safe from the vagaries of the constant search for another to complete ourselves. On the other hand, we seek to join with our opposite, procreate, exclude, claim, destroy and amass. At times, we may seek only one or the other of these states, but for the most part, we feel and act upon both at all times, dividing our energies between inherently inconsistent goals.

The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Androgyny David S. Rosenthal Adjunct Professor of Fine Art University of Cincinnati