Week 4: Medicine + Technology + Art Video

Week 4: Medicine + Technology + Art Video

A work of art, technology, and medicine

This week’s lecture was very interesting to me because I find medical technology to be one of the, if not THE, greatest achievements in human history. It’s impressive to think that this all started hundreds of years ago when people in the Eastern world performed human dissections in order to represent human anatomy correctly. Like Professor Vesna mentioned, human dissection is the exact intersection of art and science. Both artists and scientists had to be fascinated by cadavers, human flesh, and the structure of bones in order to work hand in hand with researchers and doctors to document and illustrate the human body as accurately as possible. 

Human dissection performed by professionals in different fields of study

When discussing plastic surgery, it got to my attention that all of this technology resulted out of World War I, because so many soldiers had lost their limbs and doctors had to work on replacing these parts of their bodies. Although this isn’t where plastic surgery started—it actually started 4,000 years ago in India—, this is what made it necessary. As a side note, it was very interesting to learn that “plastic” doesn’t refer to artificial, but it’s derived from the Ancient Greek word “plasticos” which means to give mold or form. In regards to plastic surgery, in the society that I used to live in before going to college, women used this kind of surgical procedures for their faces. They had a beauty standard set by society and took advantage of plastic surgery to look just like they desired to. Personally, I see plastic surgery more as an artwork than a scientific procedure. To me, a plastic surgeon is an example of the “third culture” that Brockman talks about, he/she needs to be both a doctor and an artist who can create beauty through medical and artistic abilities.

Plastic surgery became a necessity after World War I

Orlan and Kevin Warwick are the two people mentioned in this lecture that impressed me the most. I believe Orlan is the perfect example of a work that links medicine, technology, and art in a very unique manner. What I liked most about her works is how her face has the feature of different painter’s artwork, like Venus, Psyche, Europa, Diana, and the Mona Lisa. She not only embodies the vision of beauty created by painters throughout history, but she also gives each feature a very symbolic meaning. Now, with Kevin Warwick I was simply impressed by his ability to foresee what medicine would turn into in the next years. He claimed that “Electronic, as opposed to chemical, medicine might well become the norm.” He is saying that these technological advancements through bioengineering could be the cure to Parkinson’s disease, blindness, arthritis, schizophrenia, etc. 

Orlan reads philosophical texts while plastic surgery is being performed on her

All in all, through personal experience I have seen the advance in medical technology and I have had the opportunity to benefit from this. As a basketball player, I have had several surgeries on my knee and my fingers. My last surgery has been both the longest yet the most technological one. After tearing my ACL I was scared that my leg was going to have multiple scars, but due to the technology used I have nothing but one tiny scar on the right side of my knee. Although this is a minor example, it reflects what surgery will look like in the next few years. I am excited to see what the medical world will be capable of doing due to the advancement in the fields of art, medicine, and technology. 

The future of the medical world is one that excites me 

Works Cited:  

Cox, Savannah. "The Altered Faces Of War." All That Is Interesting. ATI, 07 Sept. 2013. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.

"Contoversial Artist Orlan The Reincarnation of Saint-Orlan." Creative Mapping. Creative Mapping, 19 Nov. 2014. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.

"Department of Bioengineering." Department of Bioengineering at University of Colorado Denver │ Anschutz | Bioengineering | University of Colorado Denver. The Regents of the University of Colorado, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.

Gromala, Diana. “Curative Powers of Wet, Raw Beauty” Ted Talk. TEDxAmericanRiviera, 07 Dec. 2011. Accessed 24 April 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRdarMz--Pw

Sarah Dowie. "Quiz: Are you a Bioengineering expert?" BioMed Central Ltd. Springer Nature, 07 Oct. 2016. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.

Zuger, Abigail. "Snapshots From the Days of Bare-Hands Anatomy." The New York Times. The New York Times, 27 Apr. 2009. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.