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Immersive new exhibition explores the pitfalls of defying old age

Michael Schindhelm's exhibition explores the possibilities and perils of living healthily for centuries – or at least much longer than today

By Alexandra Thompson

12 June 2024

Exhibition view, THE END OF AGING - by Michael Schindhelm, ?Surgery Room?, Kulturstiftung Basel H. Geiger, 2024

A woman laments her artificially long life in part of an installation by film-maker Michael Schindhelm (below)

Kulturstiftung Basel H. Geiger/KBH.G

The End of Aging
Michael Schindhelm
Kulturstiftung Basel H. Geiger, Switzerland, to 21 July

“All diseases run into one, old age,” wrote the 19th-century essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson. While ageing isn’t considered a condition in its own right, our risk of developing everything from cancer and dementia to heart disease and arthritis grows greater with every passing decade.

Ageing is also generally associated with a decline in quality of life, as a fall in energy levels coincides with new…

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