Picturing the body : five centuries of medical images an exhibition at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine / Ken Arnold.

  • Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine.
Date:
1993
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: Picturing the body : five centuries of medical images an exhibition at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine / Ken Arnold. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Drawing in Pseudo-Galen, Anathomia. England, [mid-15th century]. The image provides a general chart of various wounds. This type of figure, commonly referred to as a 'Wound Man', was sometimes used in the training of army surgeons. Western MS. 290. Pen and ink drawings on paper. Attributed to circle of Bartolomeo Passarotti (1529-1592). Bologna. These drawings show the strong concern with naturalistic depiction that so character- ized the Renaissance treatment of medical, as indeed many other subjects from nature. Similar compositions are known and have been attributed to Baccio Bandinelli, Michelangelo and Battista Franco. Plate accompanying Mundinus, Anatomia, in Johannes de Ketham, Fasciculus medicinae. Venice, 1495. This dissection scene represents a pre-Vesalian anatomical lesson at Padua. While a senior student reads from Mundinus' text, and an assistant performs the dissection, the professor attempts to relate book to body. Woodcut title-plate front Andreas Vesalius, Sorum de humani corporis fabrica librorum epitome. Basel, 1543. This heavily symbolic scene shows a crowded public anatomy conducted by Vesalius. The Epitome was first published simultaneously with the larger work De Humani Corporis Fabrica to be used as a more introductory work. In it, the plates were designed to be looked at in a sequence that revealed ever deeper layers of muscles eventually exposing the skeleton. Engravings by Giulio Bonasone (c.l498-c,1574). Bologna. Bonasone worked principally in Rome. These stylized figures of his, shown stripped of their skin to illustrate the muscles, drew significantly on knowledge gained from anatomical dissections. Plate in Juan Valverde de Hamusco, Historia de la composicion del cuerpo humano. Rome, 1556. Valverde's anatomical text was very popular and appeared in many editions and trans- lations. It owed much of its success to the copper-plate illustrations which were derived from Vesalius' woodcuts. Anatomical fugitive sheets, Tabula foeminae membra and Tabula exhibens insigniora. Wittenberg, 1573. These sheets have superimposed flaps that fold back to reveal internal organs. An accessory figure on the female sheet shows a newborn infant. Often produced in male and female pairs, these 'Adam and Eve' figures, as they are often called, became a popular instructional aid in the early 16th century, and were widely produced in France, Italy and Germany.