“At 92 years old, Albert Webb is wandering through an exhibition in London’s trendy Shoreditch. In the underground warren of rooms, echoes of recorded voices mingle with the sounds of people’s conversations. The occasional burst of laughter bounces around the walls. Wearing a white sweater that he knitted himself, Webb leans in to tell me his story. When he smiles his eyes disappear into thin creases, giving him an air of gleefulness.
A grin may seem an odd response to the question I’ve just asked – why he chose to donate his brain to medical research – but after 17 years participating in a brain study led by the aptly named Carol Brayne of the University of Cambridge, Webb discusses his decision with ease. To him, donation secures a form of immortality.
He explains that he’d knit the sweater he’s wearing many years ago, before he lost his wife Ellen. Knitting was something they had done together. “When she died, I packed it in,” he says. She had dementia toward the end of her life. This Saturday marks the ninth anniversary of her death. They were married for 57 years.
It’s a poignant story in a fitting setting. We are standing in the middle of Mind Over Matter, an exhibition inspired by the research of Brayne and colleagues that is the result of a long collaboration between artist Ania Dabrowska and social scientist Bronwyn Parry. The exhibition focuses on 12 brain donors from Brayne’s studies – the stories of their lives and triumphs, and their reasons for donating.”
Read more at
New Scientist
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