Another day, another dollar (I hope – haven’t had a contract yet).
We are at the half way point of this year’s SSCs: the first module finishes tomorrow and the second begins next week, after yet another Bank Holiday. Several students have vowed to return to the life classes, even though they are moving on to different things on Tuesday. However, their loyalties must be to the next teaching block (anaesthetics, audiology, General Practice etc.), so it’s debatable whether they will have time to travel, on public transport, to the Medical School after finishing at locations in other parts of the Potteries.
The life class produced yet more strong drawings, firstly from the model on the move, and then from a long pose. The movement drawings were particularly impressive. Feedback has been positive (to my face, at least!) with comments about the value of the classes in learning to look and see; the luxury of being able to spend 2 hours doing something quite different from medical study; and the benefits of experiencing a different kind of concentration and effort. Medical Humanities continue to be regarded as a soft option in some quarters (academic as well as student), but the work put into these drawings surely contradicts that. It ain’t easy…
An audit of last year’s students has demonstrated that they were “normally distributed” within the ranks of academic achievement, and at least one has had work published as a result of taking the Medical Humanities option. (I’ve forgotten whether the term “rank” is appropriate here – I do dimly remember having to rank results for statistical analysis, but it might have been for something different. Anyway, I’m not trying to imply that they’re smelly or rotten in any sense.)
So on to the next phase, and new students to guide through the minefields of wordprocessing and charcoal manipulation.
(And a Happy 90somethingth Birthday to my father, who qualified in Medicine in 1942, and whose copy of Gray’s Anatomy – now covered in trendy 1970s wrapping paper – has been worn to rags with 70 years of use)
A slight delay in posting this week as my computer is poorly. It’s been creaking for a while, but the stress of downloading various software add-ons to update Microsoft Office has proved too much. In a sinister turn of events, I can’t re-install any anti-virus software. Is this analagous to the phenomenon seen in bacterial culture plates, where the colony of bacteria produces a defensive ring around itself so that nothing else can get in? Do computer viruses do the same? As there’s yet another Bank Holiday coming up, I don’t think I shall be able to get the computer sorted out locally, and my Family Computer Adviser is several hundred miles away and rushed off his feet.
Last week’s life class went with a swing again, although the ambient temperature was definitely a bit chilly. Having mastered tonal drawing in 3 minutes in the previous class, the students had no trouble with negative space. I only wish we could use messier media and be a bit more adventurous.
The essays are also taking shape nicely, about which more later. There was an intriguing found drawing on the wall of the seminar room, just behind the door. Some sort of oscillating pencil mark, made by a very small person defying gravity?(or more likely something swinging from a chair).
Half way through the second week, and another very successful life class, from my point of view anyway – I’m not sure that the model would agree entirely as he got very cold feet (literally). Most of the students came back from last week, as well, which is always a good sign.
Last week we started off doing the “tearing A1 paper into progressively smaller pieces” thing at the beginning, in order to allay the Terror Inspired by Large Pieces of Paper. Within about 15 seconds of the students beginning to draw on the A5 size, it was obvious that they would have no trouble filling an A1 sheet. This week they dived into the “entirely tonal drawing” exercise with enthusiasm, and mastered it immediately. I am going to be stuck for things to challenge them with at this rate. Perhaps I will actually have to teach some anatomy?
Week 1, Year 2
Here we go again…
The new sessions have started, and the three students in Block 1 have some interesting ideas with great scope for development. During the first week they are supposed to research widely and generate even more stuff which they can then refine during the following weeks while they write and revise their essays. Ideas thrown into the melting pot of our first tutorial include the role of plastination in medical & public education, notions of the “freak show”, exploitation, consent, the increasing public availability of medical images; feminism, infertility; artists’ interpretations of their own bodily and mental distress; the anatomy and function of the brain; evolving cultural mores;;;;
I delivered my expanded talk/woffle about drawing and was embarrassed to note how many of my own drawings I’d included. My defence is that a lot of the images I’d wanted to use were “unavailable for copyright reasons” (mainly on the Tate Gallery website) – which reminds me that I still haven’t heard from the publishers of Gray’s Anatomy about using Henry Carter’s illustrations. I think I shall just go ahead, and see what happens.
The life classes got off to a good start (thanks, Trevor) and we had three returnees from last year. Once again, I was impressed by the rapid increase in confidence evident in the drawings produced over the course of the two hours. None of the new students had been to life classes before, although all of them aready show considerable ability. So – I hope we will go from strength to strength, and with any luck I will remember to charge the battery in my digital camera before next week.
