RECREATING THE BODY

Science Gallery London

Spare Parts

Blog Post | Femi Oriogun-Williams

It is difficult to replicate the complexity of any body part. Arms, legs, hands, noses, feet, ears and eyes - all are so well suited to their purposes that, if you have lived with any of them your entire life, the subsequent loss is difficult to come to terms with. The addition of the prosthetic limb is an ancient and constantly evolving practise, from wooden toes found on an Egyptian mummy all the way up to the advent of 3D printing and the promise of computer designed body parts. Could the Bionic human one day exist? This is an area into which scientists and artists tread together with equal uncertainty and wonder.

It was the combined efforts of sculptors and surgeons which would be the solution to restoring the faces of injured infantry in the wake of World War I. The face, which is not only the seat of the senses, but also the most visible manifestation of our individuality, can be a traumatic body part to lose. Anna Coleman Ladd, an American sculptor living in Paris, used photographs from before the soldiers’ injuries to model portrait masks which were later painted in oils to resemble the former features of the patient. When at last the patient, looking in the mirror, saw the completed face, they would utter the words ‘C’est Moi’ (it’s me).

In recreating the marvellous, and often mysterious complexities of the body, surgery has had to look at the body not purely from a scientific stand point. One need only flick through the sketch pads of Da Vinci to see how an artist’s fascination with the individual parts allowed him to see more clearly the mechanisms of the body as a whole. The aspiration to recreate, even on paper, the idiosyncrasies of the body is, it seems, a natural, creative and useful impulse.

The image shows masks from Anna Coleman Ladd's workshop in Paris. The top row show moulds taken from the wounded soldiers' faces, whilst below show her attempts at restorative sculpture. It is sourced from Rare Historical Photos.The reconstruction of the physical body through the mingling of art and science is something we shall be exploring in our exhibition SPARE PARTS next year. The Open Call for submissionsis open until the 16th of July so make sure to get those applications in!

June 28, 2017