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  • Article

Reversing the psychiatric gaze

Nineteenth-century psychiatrists were keen to categorise their patients’ illnesses reductively – by their physical appearance. But we can see a far more complex picture of mental distress, revealed by those patients able to express their inner worlds in art.

  • Article

Picturing mental health

Ron Hampshire created artworks while resident at Netherne psychiatric hospital. What can we learn from them?

  • Article

The painter, the psychiatrist and a fashion for hysteria

A dramatic painting brings a famous event in medical history alive. But it also tells a tale about the health preoccupations of the time.

  • Article

The shocking ‘treatment’ to make lesbians straight

Being a lesbian has never been a crime in the UK, but 50 years ago, some psychologists experimented with treatments to try to ‘cure’ women of their orientation. Find out what this involved.

All stories (15)

Images

  • Friern Hospital, Friern Barnet: patients. Photographs, 1890-1910.
  • Friern Hospital, Friern Barnet: patients. Photographs, 1890-1910.
  • Friern Hospital, Friern Barnet: patients. Photographs, 1890-1910.
  • Friern Hospital, Friern Barnet: patients. Photographs, 1890-1910.
  • The Hospital of Bethlem [Bedlam], St. George's Fields, Lambeth: the billiard room. Wood engraving by F. Vizetelly, 1860.
  • Salomon de Caus incarcerated in the mental asylum of Bicêtre. Lithograph by Lafosse after J.J. Lecurieux, 1845.
  • Bellevue Hospital, New York City: a cell with bed seen through doorway. Photograph.
  • Statues of "raving" and "melancholy" madness, each reclining on one half of a pediment, formerly crowning the gates at Bethlem [Bedlam] Hospital. Engraving by A. Birrell, 1813, after T. Stothard, 1783, after C. Cibber, 1680.
  • The Hospital of Bethlem [Bedlam], St. George's Fields, Lambeth: a female dormitory. Wood engraving by F. Vizetelly after F. Palmer, 1860.
  • A mentally ill patient with mask and hand restraints. Photograph after a wood engraving by E. Tritschler, 1908.
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All works (724)