Week 4: MedTech and Art

I never would have really made a connection between art and medicine before this week. They seem to be almost complete opposites in the way that medicine seems to be technical with specific guidelines of how to accomplish things, where art is more creative with endless boundaries surrounding to what you can do. Yet they are so connected in many different ways, you just have to take a step back and look for it. After seeing Zoran Todorovic's Operacija I thought of how surgery is like creating a artistic masterpiece. Although it still has a technical form to it, each surgery is different in the way each person is operated on and the surgeon has his own creativity to accomplish the job.


Zoran Todorovic : Operacija

Our own body is also a work of art. How each part inside and out works with with others to create a special self-aware being. Looking at the brain on an MRI we can see how our brain waves create different patterns and signals to how we think and feel. Below on the left is a map of someone's brain made with a Siemens Magnetom Allegra 3-Tesla scanner at Massachusetts General Hospital. This picture is an artistic recreation of a thought or feeling that the person had, tying art and medicine together. On the right is another example of MRI art coming from our friends at Stanford. 

                                             Laura Jacobson, Resonance Punctuated


Not only can we see art as a part of the human body, we can also use the human body as a vessel for art. On Emily Watson's On the Body portfolio she uses models as canvas's and focal points for her art. One of the common themes I saw was she uses different colored clothing and eyeshadow that match the object she's focusing on, to make it aesthetically pleasing. Another artist Alexa Meade, uses people in her art to create a 2D seeming world. These are just a few examples of how the body be used a canvas to create art, and after this week I can definitely see a connection between art and medicine but specifically the body.  


Image result for alexa meade

Sources:

Todorovic, Zoran. "A unique online source on contemporary international artists." Zoran Todorovic artist portrait. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2017.

Tuten, Tera. "9 People Who Have Turned Medical Imaging Into Art." Soliant Health. N.p., 23 July 2013. Web. 01 May 2017.

Donald, Brooke. "Artwork inspired by MRI brain scans installed at Stanford imaging center." Stanford Arts. N.p., 18 June 2013. Web. 01 May 2017.

Watson, Emily. "On the Body." Emily Watson | metal & enamel jewelry | on the body | worn jewellery | models. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2017.

Meade, Alexa. Alexa Meade Art. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 May 2017.


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