Paintings

We present the second part of our review concerning the history of autopsy. During the development of medicine the role of autopsy was obviously changing. Concurrently with the progress in the anatomical knowledge, the anatomists observed and noted both single anomalies and repetitive changes which correlated with symptoms in living patients. This is how anatomopathology came into being. We present the most famous people engaged in autopsy comprehension. We discuss main trends and ideas influencing the phenomenon of autopsy in the analyzed period: from sporadic public dissections, through theatra anatomica, introduction of autopsy to the hospital medicine and separation of anatomopathology as a medical speciality. The golden age of autopsy was the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, with a consecutive decline in frequency. Nevertheless, despite the progress in diagnostics in vivo, it seems that autopsy will keep its important place in medicine according to the old m...

This article aims to understand patient wellbeing and satisfaction and to qualify the current guidelines for the application of art in hospitals. Employing anthropological methods, we focus on the interactional aspects of art in health interventions. A user-oriented study ranked 20 paintings, followed by an experiment using paintings in the dayroom of five medical wards. Fieldwork was done over a two-week period. During the first week, dayrooms were configured without the presence of art and in the second week were configured with the artworks. Semi-structured interviews, observation, participant observation and informal conversation were carried out and were informed by thermal cameras, which monitored the usage, patient occupation and flow in two of the dayrooms. The study shows that art contributes to creating an environment and atmosphere where patients can feel safe, socialize, maintain a connection to the world outside the hospital and support their identity. We conclude that ...

As technologies for acquiring 3D data and algorithms for constructing integrated models evolve, very large data sets representing objects or environments are emerging in various application areas. As a result, significant research in computer graphics has aimed to interactively render such models on affordable commodity computers. Interest is growing in the possibility of integrating real-time analysis and transformation tools in interactive visualization environments as they become more available.

Freud's initial formulations viewed psychoanalysis as working towards the rediscovery of psychic elements - thoughts, feelings, memories, wishes, etc. - that were once known - represented in the mind, articulatable, thinkable - but then disguised and/or barred from consciousness. His subsequent revisions implicated a second, more extensive category of inchoate forces that either lost or never attained psychic representation and, although motivationally active, were not fixed in meaning, symbolically embodied, attached to associational chains, etc. Following Freud's theory of representation, the author conceptualizes these latter forces as "unrepresented" or "weakly represented" mental states that make a demand upon the mind for work and require transformation into something that is represented in the psyche, if they are to be thought about or used to think with. This paper describes, discusses and presents illustrations of this transformational process (f...

The Renaissance represented a major advance in painting techniques, subject matter, artistic style and the use of pigments and pigment mixtures. However, most pigments in general use were still mineral-based as most organic dyes were believed to be fugitive; the historical study of artists' palettes and recipes has assumed importance for the attribution of art works to the Renaissance period. Although the application of diagnostic elemental and molecular spectroscopic techniques play vital and complementary roles in the analysis of art works, elemental techniques alone cannot definitively provide the data needed for pigment identification. The advantages and limitations of Raman spectroscopy for the definitive diagnostic characterisation of yellow pigments that were in use during the Renaissance is demonstrated here in consideration of heavy metal oxides and sulphides; these data will be compared with those obtained from analyses of synthetic yellow pigments that were available during the eighteenth and nineteenth Centuries which could have been used in unrecorded restorations of Renaissance paintings.

The research work closely examine the themes and aesthetics of Raja Ravi Varma paintings which influenced other areas of visual culture in India. By furcating through the themes and topics of his paintings, I gained the general understanding that, he brought in modernism by staying within the clauses of traditional aspects. Ravi Varma through his themes, actualized Indian epics and retold those in the most colorful and realistic way.
Themes raging from desire to mythology, feminism, nationalism and modernism were canvassed by him. The influence exerted through these works in 19th and 20th centuries was exemplary that a colossal line of distinction, the Pre-Ravi Varma and Post-Ravi Varma Era was created in Indian art history.

Rabindranath Tagore began painting relatively late in his career when he was in his sixties. Nevertheless he produced thousands of works and was the first Indian artist to exhibit his works across Europe, Russia and the United States in 1930. His painting style was very individual, characterized by simple bold forms and a rhythmic quality, and later served to inspire many modern Indian artists. Tagore painted landscapes, animal figures and human faces. The human faces are a prominent constant in his artistic works. This motif shows his infinite interest in human persona. He turned the faces into a mask or a hieratic symbol of a social type in his paintings. His faces are varied in appearance and social stature and they encompass within their own lineaments of vast human experience.

This dissertation is an exploration of the context surrounding the creation of a single painting, now in the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh. I will begin with a general introduction to the painting, which I will refer to as the Edinburgh Madonna, including previous theories regarding the extraordinary trompe l’oeil frame. Following that, I have divided the context into two spheres, the devotional and the artistic. Leading with the devotional context, I will introduce the methods of piety as practiced in the fifteenth century, then discuss the specific penitential and ascetic tenor of devotion in Ferrara. Many of the unique artistic decisions made by the painter of the Edinburgh Madonna can be understood as responding to the demands of Ferrarese piety. Following contemplation of the Edinburgh Madonna as a devotional object, I will consider it as a painting produced in the context Ferrarese artistic production.
First, introducing another painting that, I will provide justification for believing, is by the artist of the Edinburgh Madonna, then by comparing specific aspects of the Edinburgh Madonna to other Ferrarese panel paintings. Finally I will consider the extraordinary conceptualisation of space in relation to manuscript illumination. In concord, these comparisons will provide an overall understanding of the decisions made by the painter in the creation of this extraordinary painting.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the visual representation of dignity, through the particular example of the seventeenth century Spanish painter Diego Velázquez. Velázquez works at a point in Western history when modern conceptions of dignity are beginning to be formed. It is argued that Velázquez' portraits of royalty and aristocracy articulate a tension between a feudal conception of majesty and a modern conception of the dignity of merit. On this level, modern conceptions of dignity of merit are understood in terms of a struggle to excel in particular activities, and thus to overcome the risk of failure. More radically, Velázquez' portraits of dwarfs and the mentally disabled are argued to be expressive of dignity, not by finding a positive representation of the sitter's dignity, or to find scales of activities by which they can be positively assessed, but rather by grounding their dignity, negatively, in a protest against indignity and humiliation. Drawing on ...

Piranesi was an extraordinarily talented artist who came to be considered the best known engraver and etcher of the 18th century. He spent his lifetime recording the magnificent buildings and ruins of ancient Rome. In his earlier work, he developed architectural fantasies and dark visions of imaginary prisons, the Carceri d'Invenzione (Imaginary Prisons), which have fascinated people ever since they first appeared. They also made an impact in later artistic and literary contexts. Today they are considered the best expression of bewilderment, of the world's massive oppression of man. How did Piranesi generate such a powerful source of meaning? I have reviewed a number of contributions by art essayists in the search for what lies behind the fascination of the 'Carceri'. Analysis of these texts provides a rich set of aesthetic and psychological attributes as well as detailed indications of where to seek the source of the meanings. I suggest here a fruitful integration o...

The first volume of the complete catalogue of FLATZ's works (two of the planned four volumes were published) includes an illustrated list of all paintings, sculptures and objects realised from 1972 to 1989. Thomas Dreher prepared the list and introduced into the work of FLATZ. This article, the foreword by Veit Loers and two texts by FLATZ were published in German and English.