Narrative remains / Karen Ingham.

  • Ingham, Karen, 1959-
Date:
2009
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Narrative remains / Karen Ingham. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    (Rear A set of five dental pros theses used for reconstructive surgery in the First World War RCSOHHC 20.912 (Centre) A dental splint with a plate to support a skin graft, made at Queen Mary's Hospital. Sidcup. 1918 Science Museum A6O09S6 (Front) Kyle's malleable nasal splints, used for retonstrucuwe surgery, c.1918 HCSKX66 On studying the specimen two centuries later, the eye is still drawn to the mass of the tumour, rendered self-evident through its centrality, as a silent testimony to Hunter’s trained touch. Through the case history and inscribed name, the preparation was imbued with a narrative, spoken through the patient’s own body. Crucially, Hunter’s authority in Thurlow’s case-history was constructed not in opposition to the patient, but rather as his servant, and his defender against anatomically ignorant physicians. It is a measure of Hunter’s success in enlisting the bodies of his patients as witnesses to his skill that, after he died, his collection was purchased by the government and presented to the Company (shortly to become the Royal College) of Surgeons. The Hunterian Collection has been treasured by the College ever since, the physical and symbolic presence around which the body-corporate of surgeons has shaped itself. But as the fortunes of surgeons have waxed, so the status of the patient, as represented through Hunter’s preparations, has waned. Within the museum, preparations were stripped of their identities: names scrubbed from the tops of jars, and excised from their accompanying case-histories.
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