#WORD-Transformation(1)

The only reason why I go to Oxford is Pitt Rivers Museum, the one that I have known and wished to visit for a year.

I read a book about heads cut and heads lost by one professor who worked in Pitt Rivers, and those heads illustrated were all among permanent collections in that museum. The heads, as you know, are indeed not that beautiful and impressive, but the history of them are much more interesting.

The heads are the most important part of a body in some countries, and you should not pat little children on their heads. This is more like a tradition. And in some ancient tribes, it is a ritual to do carvings and paintings on heads cut from their rivals, and dance around the ‘art object’ or war trophy to transfer the head owner’s spiritual power into their bodies, which indicates high reverence for heads. What catches me most is the notion of its transformation from an organ into ‘art object’ through wars. It does not function as items looted from the Summer Palace in China did, and has already lost values, specifically, economic values. Not so many collectors want tobacco pipe made from human body. Transformation from a normal object or lousy thing into a delicate art work here is rather appealing, as the thoughts behind the process are sometimes are hard to trace. Those soldiers who did such acts in fact did not know the reason, and maybe it was both the physical and mental environment that motivated them.

Transformation is a prevalent theme nowadays, not only in movies (horror films or sci-fi) but also in art and tales, especially in terms of human transforming into nonhuman creatures. And I think I will come back later talking about animals and humans in fairytales.