Week 4: Medicine and Art

            As a neuroscience major the discussion about MRI in art was particularly relevant to me. Many of the papers I read involved MRI images. They were indeed beautiful, but it had never occurred to me that others would think the same thing and create artworks out of those images. Vesna in her Medicine Pt.2 video the relevance of MRI images, but I find fMRI (functional magnetic resonance images) to be the most beautiful as it creates a real-time video of the human brain in action. However, in studying MRI images, I had never heard of people experiencing things known as “vibration drawings” which is the body experiencing the MRI image being taken through vibrations experienced with the ears and felt with the muscles and skin. Silvia Casini discusses these “vibration drawings” and discusses how MRI images aren’t just to be looked at, but are also, as she describes them, “performative” where the image is more acustic than visual. Her take is extremely interesting as demonstrates how MRI images aren’t to just be experienced visually as art, but also bodily.

 

fMRI showing cerebral spinal fluid pulsing with
the human heartbeat
http://www.centerofbrainandspinesurgery.com/glossary_brain.html

Personal photo of a preserved human
fetus at the Body World Exhibit

            It never truly occurred to me in how many ways medical devices could be used until I visited the Body World Exhibition myself at the California Science Center. The exhibition used a process called plastination, typically used to preserve the body after death to study the body’s anatomy. However, the exhibition used the preserved bodies in an artistic fashion, casting them so that they were involved in daily activities, but with the skin removed to demonstrate the beauty of the human body. It was a very evocative experience causing me to appreciate just how flexible and adaptable the human body is. At other body dissections I’ve been to, the body is typically just laid on a table and the body is carefully opened on the table and only the part being examined that day is taken apart. It was a completely new experience at the Body World Exhibition to view the entire human body in the midst of sports or daily routines.

Personal photo from the Body World Exhibit of two people
playing hockey

References

Bauer, J., Ruge, J., Herman, M., & Bovis, G. (2018). Center of Brain and Spine Surgery | Brain Glossary. Centerofbrainandspinesurgery.com. Retrieved 30 April 2018, from http://www.centerofbrainandspinesurgery.com/glossary_brain.html

Casini, S. (2011). Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) as Mirror and Portrait: MRI Configurations between Science and the Arts. Configurations, 19(1), 73-99. http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/con.2011.0008

Ingber, D. (1998). The Architecture of Life. Scientific American, 48-57.

Lantermann, E. (2018). Philosophy - Körperwelten. Körperwelten. Retrieved 30 April 2018, from https://bodyworlds.com/about/philosophy/

Riederer, B. (2013). Plastination and its importance in teaching anatomy. Critical points for long-term preservation of human tissue. Journal Of Anatomy, 224(3), 309-315. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/joa.12056