Student Essay

Natalia Lebedinskaia
This essay was written by an M.A. student in a Museum Practice seminar in the Department of Art History, Faculty of Fine Arts, Concordia University. The seminar was taught by Dr. Loren Lerner with the assistance of Dina Vescio, a M.A. graduate of the program.

Introduction

The Clay-Adams anatomical model at the Canada Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa was manufactured by an American company, Clay-Adams Inc., in Japan, in the 1950s. Constructed out of papier-mâché and hand-painted, the model was a relatively inexpensive, practical, and durable tool for conveying medical information to patients and students.¹ All the body parts come apart, revealing intricate details with labels for easy identification (fig. 1). The model presents the human as a complex mechanism that can be analysed by the physician.

When looking at models such as the one produced by Clay-Adams, it is important to situate them within the rich European history of anatomical display dating back to the early 18th century. This paper will chronicle the exhibition practices that have guided the display and production of anatomical models, both for private medical practice and for public education. With a geographical focus on Florence, Paris, Dresden, and Cleveland, Ohio, I will explore how popular beliefs about the body can reveal the ideals of a society, in particular about gender and morality. While I cannot attempt a comprehensive history of medical display in this short paper, my analysis will demonstrate the relationships between early depictions of anatomy and the Clay-Adams model.

Flowing Hair and Silken Cushions: La Specola Museum in Florence

In 1771 Peter Leopold of Babsurb-Lotharingen, Grand Duke of Tuscany combined the various scientific collections from the smaller galleries of the Grand Duchy into a single museum. The first of its kind, it was called the Imperial Regio Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale, also known as La Specola.² Anatomical models filled eight rooms of this museum, and its wax workshop gained international fame for the production of extremely accurate and visually stunning renditions of the human body. ³ These were sold to numerous institutions around Europe.⁴ In the first fifty years of its operation, however, most of the models were made especially for the La Specola.⁵

Often referred to as “Anatomical Venuses”, the female bodies at La Specola are depicted in seductive poses reclining on silk cushions, in concert with the predominant taste of the period in painting or sculpture (fig. 2).⁶ In this example of a pregnant woman, the skin is translucent and life-like, her face is calm and composed, and her eyes are gently closed. The turn of her head and long flowing hair draws attention to her sensuality.⁷ She lures the spectator to the subject of her anatomy through allusions to sexual availability and desire. Ludmilla Jordanova, in her study of La Specola, has emphasized the stark contrast between the passive female reposing figures and the active male anatomical bodies, often shown as upright and heroic.⁸

Paris: Medical Moulage and Desire

Towards the end of the 18th century, a shift in the approach to anatomy affected the production and display of wax anatomical models. Medical and veterinary institutions were now considered more appropriate sites for educational displays of anatomy, away from the spectacle of the public museum. Simultaneously, the anatomical model shifted from the exhibition of the healthy body into an exploration of its pathologies.⁹

This change was implemented at the Hôpital  Saint-Louis in 1889 when a large lecture hall opened to the public, displaying hundreds of wax moulages of skin diseases behind glass to give them an air of objectivity (fig. 3).¹⁰ As Mary Hunter argues in her article “ ‘Effroyable realisme’: Wax, Femininity, and the Madness of Realist Fantasies,” the moulages at Hôpital Saint-Louis, produced largely under Doctor Jules-Émile Péan, evoked a different type of desire and subjugation of the body.¹¹ Péan was interested in depictions of diseased genitalia. These graphic models of the vulva and clitoris could be viewed not only by medical professionals and students but by the public. They were cast directly from the suffering patient’s skin, claiming to be “pure reproductions” of various medical conditions.¹² However, additional details such as the choice to include pubic hair, and frequent inclusion of the doctor’s fingers, point to a different understanding (fig. 4).¹³ According to Mary Hunter, this realism “…was intricately bound to professional, institutional, and personal desire, as both artists and doctors used realism to stand in for the rational characteristics with which they wished to be associated.”¹⁴

The shocking nature of these moulages helped them gain popularity for large-scale projects to fight venereal disease in Europe and North America. A number of them were brought to Canada in 1923 from Paris by the Ottawa Social Hygiene Council for the Ottawa’s Central Canada Exhibition. The models attracted most attention, accompanied by posters and slides. In contrast to the exhibitions in Paris, the exhibit in Ottawa was open to men only, showing the trend of how men and women were educated differently about venereal disease in Canada. Many women tried to enter the exhibit but were prohibited, warned against viewing the shocking material.¹⁵ The exhibit traveled widely around Canada, continuing to be open to men only.¹⁶

From Dresden to Cleveland: Bruno Gebhard’s Role in Founding the Cleveland Health Museum

Similarly, the fight against sexually transmitted diseases was the priority in Germany in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Large exhibitions included whole sections dedicated to the body and venereal diseases.¹⁷ One such exhibition, titled Widespread Diseases and their Control, took place in Dresden from 1903 until 1906. This event was instrumental in establishing the Deutsches Hygiene-Museum for the permanent display of its material.¹⁸ When the National Socialists came to power in 1933, the museum was seized and transformed into a site of propaganda, altering its existing displays to incorporate Nazi party ideals.¹⁹

Bruno Gebhard served as the chief curator at the Deutsches Hygiene-Museum from 1927 until 1935. During his years there, with the rise of Nazi ideology he played a key role in shaping public opinion, even though he refused to join the Nazi party. After fleeing Germany with his wife Gertrude Herrmann Gebhard in 1937, he helped to develop health museums across the United States. His largest project was the establishment of the Cleveland Health Museum in 1940. The main focus of this museum was to educate the visitors by using interactive displays, a strategy still popular in many health and science museums today, including the Canada Science and Technology Museum.²⁰

The last exhibition that Gebhard curated in Germany was in 1935. Titled The Wonder of Life, this was a demonstration of how the body works. The exhibition had deep Nazi overtones by asserting through its texts and artifacts that societies were like human bodies in following the directions of their “brain.”²¹ At the centre of the exhibition on a raised platform was the “Transparent Man”, a towering male figure made of plastic with organs visible below his transparent skin. With outstretched arms and head looking upwards he was the embodiment of a grandiose future (fig. 5). This figure depicted the human body as a machine: “understandable, immaculate, and, if well cared for, durable.”²² A similar female figure in the Cleveland Health Museum was commissioned by Gebhard in 1950 (fig. 6). Both male and female transparent figures lacked genitalia, and were reproduced widely in the United States as a children’s toy in 1959, and for many museums around the country in the following decades.²³ In a reevaluation of the shock tactics guiding the display of graphic models and moulages, the American museum continued the tradition of regulating public knowledge of the human body, this time by presenting sexuality as inappropriate and invisible for pedagogical display.

Public anatomical displays are continued today in museums around the world through exhibitions such as the immensely popular Body Worlds by Dr. Gunther von Hagens, currently on view in Philadelphia, Toronto, Cologne, Zurich, Singapore, and Haifa.²⁴ He uses the process of plastination to preserve real human bodies that are displayed in life-like poses at science centres and museums (fig. 7).²⁵ Presented as art, they occupy the boundary between medical neutrality and artistic license, pointing to a vague ethical territory where real human bodies are used as sites of spectacle.²⁶

Mass Production: Papier-mâché and the Clay-Adams Anatomical Model

The Clay-Adams anatomical models, although tied to the history of anatomical displays, have a different purpose. They belong to a tradition of mass-produced teaching models used by the physicians. Its origins date back to the 19th century France where in the early 1820s Dr. Louis Auzoux began producing papier-mâché models at a factory in the village of Saint-Aubin- d’Ecrosville. Guided by the ideals of producing inexpensive models for teaching purposes, Auzoux’s creations were extremely popular (fig. 8).²⁷ In comparison to the later mass-productions, the Auzoux models were delicate and expensive because they tried to replicate the wax model’s level of detail.

In contrast, the Clay-Adams model could be afforded by local physicians for their offices, and could be handled frequently to explain ailments directly to the patient. Perhaps the lack of realism in the Clay-Adams model can be explained by this relationship. Instead of aiming to simulate live dissection, eroticize the female body, shock with pathological displays, teach moral values, or partake of a Nazi ideology, this was simply a three-dimensional diagram to assist in communicating ideas about the body.

The model was created for physicians and not originally intended for museum display. Its place in the collection of the Canada Science and Technology Museum situates it as a historical object, closer to the tradition of collecting medical history artifacts by Canadian museums.²⁸ While these museums also house wax moulages from the Hôpital Saint-Louis in Paris, these are not displayed with the function of preventative medicine, but as signifiers of the transformations of medical profession. However, it is important to acknowledge relationships between historical displays of anatomy and their use in private physicians’ practice, as both of these applications are integrally tied to the societies and contexts in which they exist. ²⁹

LIST OF FIGURES

fig. 1 Clay-Adams durable female anatomical model (produced by Clay-Adams Co, Inc.), c. 1950, papier-mâché and wood, 46.5 x 30.5 x 8.5 cm, Canada Science and Technology Museum.

fig. 2 Venus figure from the workshop of Clemente Susini (whole body specimen of a pregnant woman with removable layers), 1770-75, metal or wood skeleton, transparent wax and variously coloured waxes with pigments, 180 x 80 cm, Florence, Museo di Storia Naturale, Zoologica, “La Specola”. (Photo: {http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Specola_19.jpg})

fig. 3 Musée des moulages, Le Musée de l’Hôpital Saint-Louis. (Photo: Musée des moulages {http://sfhd.chez.com/musee/musee.htm})

fig. 4 Cylindrome de la grande lèvre gauche, récidivant. Femme âgée de 36 ans, sans profession. La lésion, qui présente une analogie avec le botryomycome, a été un peu affaissée par le plâtre au moment du moulage ; elle avait normalement le volume d’une petite noisette (Obs.in Bull. de la Soc. fr. de derm. et de syph., 1920, p. 9) (Photo: STLCGE02882, Musée des moulages de l’Hôpital Saint-Louis (AP-HP), L. Nicolet, Collection générale n° 2882, vitrine 6 {http://web2.bium.univ-paris5.fr/img/?do=serie&refphot=STLCGE02882&mod=s})

fig. 5 Wonder of Life exhibition, Germany, 1937. (Photo: National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland. (Photo: {http://www.dhmd.de/neu/fileadmin/template/ dhmd/images/uploads/pressefotos/DEME_PRESSEFOTOS/PF_Wunder_des_Lebens.jpg})

fig. 6 Postcard of Juno, the Transparent Talking Woman, at the Cleveland Health Museum, c. 1940, paper postcard, 7.5 x 12.75 cm. (Photo: Postcards of Cleveland Collection, Cleveland State University, Michael Schwartz Library, Special Collections {http://images.ulib.csuohio.edu/cgi-bin/getimage.exe?CISOROOT=/postcards&CISOPTR=1004&DMSCALE=100.00000&DMWIDTH=750&DMHEIGHT=1600&DMX=0&DMY=0&DMTEXT=%20juno&REC=2&DMTHUMB=0&DMROTATE=0})

fig. 7 Visitor at Body Worlds in Oberhausen, Germany, 2000/2001, viewing Plastinate: The Woman Bearing Life, Gunther von Hagens’  BODY WORLDS, Institute for Plastination, Heidelberg, Germany. (Photo: {http://www.bodyworlds.com/en/media/picture_database/ preview.html?id=50})

fig. 8 Papier-mâché and plaster model of a human by Dr. Auzoux, 1848, Whipple Museum of the History of Science, University of Cambridge. (Photo: {http://www.hps.cam.ac.uk/whipple/ explore/models/drauzouxsmodels/humanmodels/})

NOTES

1. Susan Lamb, “An Analysis of Anatomy Models from the Eighteenth, Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries,” Topics in Material Culture, 8 Nov. 2009 {http://individual.utoronto.ca/ twix/anatomy/ index.htm}.
2. Monika von Düring, Georges Didi-Huberman and Marta Poggesi, Encyclopaedia Anatomica: a Complete Collection of Anatomical Waxes (Köln: Taschen, 1999): 11.
3. Düring, 13.
4. Clemente Susini, Alessandro Riva and Luigi Cattaneo, Flesh & Wax: The Clemente Susini’s Anatomical Models in the University of Caligari (Nuoro, Italy: Ilisso, 2007): 40 and 43.The producers of these models used dissected corpses as reference. Sometimes up to two hundred for a single model were required as there was no way to preserve the cadavers from decomposing. The immense amount of time and resources dedicated to manufacturing the wax bodies for the museum highlights the value that was placed on depicting accurate scientific information and making it available to the public, physicians, and students.
5. Düring, 12.
6. Düring, 13; and Susini, 40.
7. Susini, 54.
8. Susini, 48.
9. Roberta Panzanelli, Julius Schlosser, and Julius Schlosser, Ephemeral Bodies: Wax Sculpture and the Human Figure (Los Angeles, Calif: Getty Research Institute, 2008) 84.
10. Mary Hunter, “‘Effroyable Réalisme’: Wax, Femininity, and the Madness of Realist Fantasies”, RACAR 33:1-2 (2008): 43-56, 51.
11. Hunter, 53.
12. Hunter, 47.
13. Hunter, 52. In addition to these details, the models also included signatures by the doctor and artist, as well as the details about the disease, while not avoiding all mention of the model.
14. Hunter, 55.
15. “Ottawa Social Hygiene Council Exhibit for ‘Men Only’, Central Canada Exhibition, Ottawa, Ontario, Sep. 7-17,” Canadian Public Health Journal 14 (1923) 506.
16. Jay Cassel, The Secret Plague: Venereal Disease in Canada 1838-1939 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1987) 229.
17. Thomas Schnalke, Diseases in Wax: The History of the Medical Moulage (Chicago: Quintessence, 1995) 124.
18. “Bruno Gebhard,” Nazi Medicine (Case Western Rerserve University: Dittrick Medical History Centre, 2009) 8 Nov. 2009 {http://www.cwru.edu/artsci/dittrick/site2/museum/online/Nazi/Gebhard-1.html}.
19. “Bruno Gebhard.”
20. “The Transparent Man,” Permanent Exhibitions, Deutsches Hygiene-Museum Dresden, 8 Nov. 2009 {http://www.dhmd.de/neu/index.php?id=804}. Transparent women were also created in the following years, exhibited for the first time during the New York fair in 1937. “Medicine: Museum Piece,” New York: Time (31 Aug. 1936) 17 Dec. 2009 {http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,756568,00.html})
21. “The Transparent Man.”
22. “The Transparent Man.”
23. Miriam Posner, “The Unusual Genealogy of the Visible Woman,” Projects, 8 Nov. 2009 {http://www.miriamposner.com/visiblewoman.html}.
24. Gunther von Hagens, “Exhibitions,” Body Worlds,Institute of Plastination (2006/2007) 8 Nov. 2009 {http://www.bodyworlds.com/en/exhibitions/current_exhibitions.html}.
25. Gunther von Hagens, “The Idea behind Plastination,” Body Worlds,Institute of Plastination (2006/2007) 8 Nov. 2009 {http://www.bodyworlds.com/en/plastination/idea_plastination.html}.
26. There have also been a growing number of contemporary artists who explore themes of anatomy and interiority of the body. In Canada, Janet Morton’s and Cindy Stelmackowich’s projects are especially interesting, while Mireille Perron’s drawings and installations directly reference La Specola Museum and its collection.
27. K.S. Grooss, The Anatomical Models of Dr. Louis Auzoux (Leiden: Museum Boerhaave, 2004) 117.
28. Museums such as the Kingston Museum of Healthcare and the former Museum of the Academy of Medicine in Toronto focus on medical history {http://www.museumofhealthcare.ca/}. The Museum of the Academy of Medicine in Toronto closed its doors in 2002, transferring its collections to Kingston, as well as other museums. Its large Pediatrics collection is now housed at the Royal Ontario Museum {http://www.rom.on.ca/ news/releases/public.php?mediakey=d2e2ijepzr}.
29. Kingston Museum of Healthcare has an extensive collection of medical moulage which it has acquired from the Museum of the Academy of Medicine in Toronto.