What happens when the intensions of art and science collide?
On Sunday, my friend Julie Allen took me on a tour of the Florida Museum of Natural History Museum at the University of Florida. It was part of the exhibit that is usually reserved for researchers. It contains millions of specimen from around the world.
Julie, a scientist who specializes in lice, guided me through rows and rows of animal parts—panther skins, whale vertebrae, dolphin jaws, bat wings—stored on shelves and in heavy metal cabinets.
Many of the specimen are there because they met with some tragic end: a whale struck by a tanker, a panther run over by a car. Our friend and Julie’s colleague, Pedro Mendez explained this to me over a beer a couple weeks ago. Pedro’s primary area of study is New World primates like the howler and spider monkeys. When he’s not in the field, Pedro works at the university’s museum processing and cataloging mammals in the collection. Although the museum contains animals remains from across the globe, UF specializes in those native to the southeastern United States. Pedro continually receives new specimen from this region. Many are sent by researchers and park rangers. He and the other scientists prepare the animals for preservation, then meticulously care for them.
At one point during her tour, Julie took me to the back wall where a high steel shelf holds whale bones. She handed me a right whale’s clavicle that she said had broken and re-healed. She pointed to the thick line of the break now filled in by calcium-rich tissue in a dense, haphazard bridge that reminded me of the way cooled lava settles into pockets of earth. The whale had most likely suffered a lot of pain for a long time, she said. I felt sad.
The same sad feelings came up when Julie opened boxes of endangered Florida panther bones. “This guy was hit by a car,” she said holding its crushed skull. Later she picked up what looked like part of a leg bone. “Look at that. Snapped it right in half.”
Julie acknowledged the emotions she sometimes feels. When I asked if being around animals in this condition ever got to her, she said it did. “A lot of sadness,” she said while closing one of the cabinets. How do you handle it? I asked. “I get out of here; go for a walk.”
On Monday morning my own sadness lifted a little when I realized that the individual animals Julie, Pedro, and their colleagues preserve have attained a kind of immortality. They now play an important role as representatives of their species’ story. The university’s scientists look to them to understand more about the animals’ history and the overall health of the current population.
An example was the rough edges on the Florida panther’s leg bone joint that Julie showed me. She explained that the cats had developed arthritis most likely because of inbreeding. In an attempt to improve the Florida panther’s chance of survival, researchers brought in Texas panthers to add diversity to the species. This one animal’s life, because it was shortened by tragedy, now serves as a benchmark upon which its relatives might survive a few decades longer.
Our modern cultures have become so detached from the wild things surrounding us that it is easy to forget how intertwined our lives are with theirs. Scientists like Julie and Pedro continue to remind us that human stories are inextricably linked with animals’.
Artists do too. At the dawn of the industrial revolution, Herman Melville’s Moby Dick and Thomas Cole’s painting, The Oxbow convey the impact of human progress on the natural world, including our own physical and emotional wellbeing.
This spring UF faculty member, Jamie Gillooly brought an incredible Art and Science lecture series to campus. One of the program’s highlights for me was a talk by conceptual artist, Eduardo Kac, who is known in the art world for his embrace of science. Kac offered a distinction between real scientists and artists who use scientific practices and theories in their work. He said it was a matter of intention. Scientists hope to answer questions for the purposes of classification, preservation, or deeper understanding. Artists are after something else. They operate more in the realm of poetry, of emotion and imagination.
What happens when these intentions collide?
Julie, her friend and colleague, Judit Ungvari Martin, and I are about to find out. We are embarking on a project that will reveal some of the compelling stories of—lice. For the past couple of years, Julie and Judit have been using cameras with powerful lenses to create a series of dramatic photographs that, combined with information from other sources like DNA, help them understand not only the lives of these tiny parasites, but also their hosts. We hope to present their findings in ways that convey both scientific and aesthetic objectives and meanings.
We are still in the conceptual stages and welcome your input in the comment box above.
Happy Birthday Ralph
Today is Ralph Waldo Emerson’s birthday. He said, “Live in the sunshine, swim in the sea, drink the wild air.”
Stuck in a Creative Rut? Here’s How to Try a New Art Medium
Here is an activity from my forthcoming eBook 31 Days to a More Creative You due out in fall 2012.
If you need a creative breakthrough, try a new art medium or one that you gave up long ago.
New to drawing, stretch yourself a little. Instead of using the ever-erasable pencil, try a pen, but use that pen as if you could erase your marks. Be free with your lines. Feel the difference in the way the ink glides across your paper?
If you’re a more experienced visual artist, experiment widely. If you’ve been stuck using the same medium for years, try something new. Buy a package of charcoal and make a sketch. Better yet, use a hunk of charcoal from the fireplace. Think crayons are for kids? Think again. Ask your children if you may use theirs.
For a day, consider going back to a medium you gave up long ago and see what happens. Perhaps you once painted with oils but stopped using them because of the toxic thinners. You’ve been curious about the new water-based oils since they came out a few years ago. Today’s your day. Go to a nearby art store and ask the salesperson if they can provide a demo for you.
Never used oil paint? Start with this simple exercise by artist and gallery owner, Eileen Corse. Buy an inexpensive canvas, palette knife, and three tubes of paint—phthalo (or Prussian) blue, burnt sienna, and white. Squirt the colors onto your palette and see how many colors you can create by mixing them together. Spread the new colors onto your canvas with the palette knife. Eileen says this exercise lets artists experience the feel and flexibility of oil paint economically and without the use of mineral spirits.
If you want to give up store-bought paint altogether, do something really fun and paint with nature’s bounty. Crushed blueberries, blackberries, strawberries, raspberries all make wonderful paints—so does tomato sauce. For richer, more saturated hues, cook some of the water out of your fruit and veggie paints before using them. Apply the paints you create with a regular brush onto watercolor paper.
Sometimes experimenting with a new medium encourages us to explore new directions. Other times it reminds us what we like about the ones we use most often.
Have fun and don’t pay attention to the voices of judgement and perfectionism.
Why Med-Students Need Exposure to Social Sciences and Art
A sketch by NYU med student Michael Malone who takes an art and anatomy class.
Those who oversee medical education now recognize the benefits of exposing their students to the arts. Before graduating, today’s future doctors will be required to take a heavy dose of coursework in the social sciences. The New York Times reported on April 13, 2012 that the Association of American Medical College’s has revised its medical school admissions test (MCAT), and as a result, colleges are seeing increased enrollment by pre-meds in courses other than hard science and math. To prepare for the test, which will include areas like “ethics and cross-cultural studies,” students are lining up for courses like the history of modern science taught by Professor Piers J. Hale, who teaches at the University of Oklahoma. “Enrollment doubled and I had to turn 20 away,” Hale told the Times. “But what’s really exciting is not that taking this class will get these kids into medical school, but that it will help them become better physicians.”
Dr. Charles Hatem, a professor at Harvard Medical School and an expert in medical education is less certain that the changes on the MCAT will impact the delivery of healthcare, but acknowledges the general need for more empathic doctors. “Yes, we’ve fallen in love with technology, and patients are crying out, saying, ‘Sit down and listen to me,’ ” he said. “So what the MCAT is doing has a laudable goal. But will recalibrating this instrument work? Do more courses in the humanities make you more humane? I think the best we can say is a qualified maybe.”
Many medical students are also now encouraged to take up the practice of art making, doing courses in drawing, painting, and reflective writing. The Wall Street Journal ran an article on February 1, 2011 describing arts-based programs in medical schools at Brown University, New York University and the University of Iowa. According to instructor Hedy Wald, a clinical assistant professor of family medicine at Brown, the goal of Brown’s required “Doctoring” course is to help students cultivate empathy, think critically about diagnoses, cope with uncertainty, and deal with the ethical dilemmas of their profession. “The act of writing helps you build reflective capacity so you can better understand the patient’s story and integrate it with everything you know as a doctor to have a more patient-centered-care relationship.”
What is Patient Centered Art?
“Patient centered care” is a term often used in the Arts In Healthcare community. In fact, the title for the 2011 Society for the Arts In Healthcare’s conference was “Advancing Patient-Centered Arts.” As an artist in residence in the Arts In Medicine program at Shands Hospital at the University of Florida, patient-centered care is something I am asked to embody. But what exactly does it mean?
Ideas about “patient centered care” began showing up in medical journals in the early 1990s, and doctors, academics, and policy makers continue to refine the definition and how it is used.
In an August 2010 column on the medical blog, KevinMD.com, Christine Cassel, President of the American Board of Internal Medicine, offers this definition by The Institute for Healthcare Improvement: Patient centered care considers “patients’ cultural traditions, their personal preferences and values, their family situations, and their lifestyles. It makes the patient and their loved ones an integral part of the care team who collaborate with health care professionals in making clinical decisions… [and] ensures that transitions between providers, departments, and health care settings are respectful, coordinated, and efficient. When care is patient centered, unneeded and unwanted services can be reduced.”
In a 2001 article, “Towards a Global Definition of Patient Centred Care” for the medical journal, BMJ, Moira Stewart—Professor and Director of Centre for Studies in Family Medicine, Department of Family Medicine, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada—cites studies that suggest patient centered doctors display a “flexible” style while working with patients.
Communication and understanding are key, she writes. When patients are heard and their individual concerns are addressed, evidence shows a “tangible benefit: patient centred communication is positively associated with patient satisfaction, adherence, and better health outcomes.” Stewart reminds readers that patient centered care cannot be easily broken up and examined. While classifications may be useful for teaching and research, “patient centred clinical practice is a holistic concept in which components interact and unite in a unique way in each patient-doctor encounter.”
Patient centered care envisions a real collaboration between patient, family members, and healthcare providers and ultimately seeks to move control of healthcare into the hands of the person receiving it.
Though I’m not a physician or member of a hospital’s medical staff, I believe the concept is worth applying to my work as an artist in residence. Doing so requires me to take the patient’s lead in everything I do, from entering a room to recommending an activity or art project.
Oncologist’s Website Profiles Patients Who “Seize The Days”
Photo by Emily Friedman
Across the United States, cancer was the second leading cause of death in 2007, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. On January 1, 2008, there were approximately 11,957,599 men and women alive who had a history of cancer (5,505,862 men and 6,451,737 women). This year, The National Cancer Institute estimates that 1,596,670 men and women (822,300 men and 774,370 women) will be diagnosed with and 571,950 men and women will die of cancer.
One oncologist at Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center is using art’s potential to help patients deal with physical and emotional challenges brought on by the dreaded illness. In his essay in the Journal of Clinical Oncology (2011) “Art in Oncology: How Patients Add Life to Their Days,” Dr. Evan Lipson writes about the ways patients use art to transform their lives post-diagnosis. Lipson writes that part of his role as a physician is to find ways for his patients to live full lives within the context of cancer. He does this, in part, by encouraging them to tell stories and make art. “People living with a serious illness develop novel, often overwhelming feelings that defy expression by the usual means.” Art, Lipson writes, helps patients communicate their feelings in ways words alone cannot. Art also offers benefits beyond self-expression. “For some patients, art is a way to leave behind something tangible, a palpable reminder, perhaps. For others, art is an escape, a brief vacation from the roller coaster.”
Dr Lipson has also created a website called SeizeTheDays.org that features short audio clips (usually 2 or 3 minutes) of cancer patients describing how they are making the most of their lives during and after cancer. All of the patients featured on the website are doing “positive, meaningful things” said Dr. Lipson in a recent phone interview. Patient stories on seizethedays.org represent the complicated ways cancer impacts people’s lives. Many people on the site have dealt with multiple diagnoses and faced a number of personal challenges after receiving their life-altering diagnosis. They have lost time at work, had disrupted relationships. Yet all speak eloquently about how they are moving forward with their lives in the present moment irregardless of the circumstances.
Dr. Lipson’s essay and website have been an important find. His essay confirms the power of individuals to transform their experience of illness through art. His website offers examples of patients and families who have positively reimagined and changed their experience of life post-diagnosis. Their stories may be useful to the patients I see in a variety of ways. Dr Lipson said they may feel less isolated by listening to the experiences of others: “I’ve had patients get on to the site and say it showed them ‘I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only one dealing with this. I wasn’t the only soldier in this battle.’” The stories also offer hope. Patients can hear that “people are still able to find positivity in what is otherwise a horrible journey.”
For more about Dr. Lipson and his website, see this story by NPR.
