 | "The Art of Medicine" will consider images of medical issues, such as this one, "The Headache," a detail from a hand-colored etching by George Cruikshank (after Frederick Marryat), part of the Clement C. Fry Collection at Cushing/Whitney Medical Library. |
A symposium exploring the ways that doctors and the world of medicine have been depicted in words and images throughout history and across cultural boundaries will be held at Yale Thursday-Saturday, April 15-17.
The organizers of the event -- titled "The Art of Medicine: Image-Making and Communication" -- write: "Medicine is both science and art. ... A conversation between patient and doctor means summoning up images of how the body works and of how illness is experienced. Communication is key in medicine, and the image plays a central role in this process.
"The production and interpretation of images is always an unstable business," they continue, "subject to the varying perspectives of spectators and fashions in theory, so that, for example, the wandering womb visualized by a Roman doctor can later be reinterpreted as a symptom of neurological disease or a psychological disorder."
By considering pictures and texts side by side, speakers at the symposium will compare communication in ancient, medieval and modern medicine in Eastern and Western medical cultures.
Best-selling author Dr. Sherwin Nuland, clinical professor of surgery (gastroenterology) at Yale, will deliver a plenary lecture titled "The Artist Examines the Doctor: A Millennium and a Half of Clinical Observation" at 6 p.m. on April 16 in the Law School's Levinson Auditorium, 127 Wall St.
The symposium will also include seven sessions: "Images of the Doctor," "Doctors' Stories," "Imaging Medicine East and West," "Literature Visualizing Medicine," "Images of the Patient," "Imaging Media" and "The Art of Display." The speakers hail from both sides of the Atlantic, and will include Gillian Beer, Dimitri Gutas, John Hollander, Susan Lederer, Richard Selzer, Dennis Spencer, Frank Turner, John Harley Warner and Susan Wheeler of Yale. These sessions will be held at three locations: Whitney Humanities Center, 53 Wall St.; Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, 121 Wall St.; and Cushing/Whitney Medical Library, 333 Cedar St.
In conjunction with the symposium, there will be two exhibits on the theme of art and medicine -- one at the Beinecke Library titled "The Art of Medicine: Medical Manuscripts from the Beinecke and the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library"; and one at the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library titled "Medicine Caricatured: British Satirical Prints of the Late 18th and Early 19th Centuries." The event is also being held in conjunction with the Tanner Lectures on Human Values, Wednesday and Thursday, April 14-15. (See related story.)
"The Art of Medicine: Image-Making and Communication" is sponsored by the Whitney Humanities Center, the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library and the Yale Center for British Art.
The symposium is free and open to the public. Because space is limited, advance registration is suggested. For a complete schedule or to register, send e-mail to diane.bowman@yale.edu or visit the website at www.artofmedicine.yale.edu/.
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