We have four broad headings for our topics: Illustration/explanation; Art & Illness; Imaging the body; Death, art, culture & medicine. Two of the students have chosen to examine the role of illustration in explanation, so I went to my local G.P.’s surgery to see what sort of patient information leaflets were available. To my amazement, the few leaflets available contained no illustrations at all – just a few photographs of cheerful faces, and a lot of very dense text. The asthma leaflet did at least have a picture of a couple of inhalers – which turns out to be about as much illustration as was available on a selection of websites dealing with the condition. (To be fair, there were some video clips including several in British Sign Language, which looked pretty scary). This is all fine, providing you a) have access to the Internet, and/or b) can read closely packed type. There’s certainly a lot of scope for an illustrator in this particular field, I think.
I think my GPs must feel the same, as they have tacked up two excellent, beautifully drawn & coloured A1 posters showing the effects of smoking and of high cholesterol. Not very cheerful, perhaps, and one of them contains the facsimile of Henry Gray’s signature – he wrote the text for the Anatomy book, but Henry Carter did the illustrations. Carter is very definitely an unsung hero.
