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518
Medicine
The Art of Learning Stefan
Art
Medicine
C. Schatzki1
artist, May Lesser, went to UCLA She was allowed to attend the anatomy lectures and dissecting laboratory given to the first-year medical students. As she sketched the experiences that were new not only to her but also to the prospective physicians, she soon became accepted by the students and made friends with many of them. Lesser’s drawings and etching were so good and so sensitive to the complex interactions that were occurring during the first term, that the professor of anatomy suggested she go all the way through medical school as an artist with the class of 1971.
manent collection of a number of museums, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum, the Oklahoma Art Center, and the National Library of Medicine. She has recently published a new book ofetchings and paintings, AnArtist in the University Medical Center, documenting the activities of the Tulane University Medical
In the fall of 1967, a 40-year-old Medical School to study anatomy.
Center, where her husband
an insightful infrequently, way,
now teaches.
The etching reproduced here “shows the professor and his students examining the X-rays.” This work clearly captures the atmosphere of the decision-making process that goes on during the evaluation of films from a carotid artenogram, while at the same time preserving the artist’s subjective prerogative.
Many members of the faculty were extremely skeptical about having an artist participate in the students’ experiences, so during the next three and one-half years, Lesser relied on a variety of means to gain access to the different disciplines and experiences that make up the medical curriculum. Sometimes, faculty members who had experienced Lesser’s unique sensitivity to the learning of medicine introduced her to subsequent teachers. Occasionally, she would draw
this
in American
portrait of a professor and give it to him as a gift. Not her friends would simply take her to class with them. In she
spent
room,
laboratory,
special
sensitivity
four
X-ray
years
room,
sitting
in the
corner
of
the
lecture
emergency
room, conference room, and even at patients’ bedsides. Because each aspect of medical school was as new to Lesser as it was to the students, she was able to capture the experience with a unique freshness as well as with a to the experiences
that
students,
faculty
and patients were having. May Lesser recorded the heart of the educational
physicians,
process,
and
thus the soul of the new physicians as they progressed from the early hesitant moments in the dissecting room to confident, welltrained, independent fourth-year students. During her four-year tenure, she produced a huge body of drawings and etchings, over 300 of which were published in a unique book, The Art of Learning Medicine
(Appleton-Century-Crofts),
in 1974.
May Lesser is uniquely qualified to record the experience of learning medicine. Her father, brothers, husband, and three of her children College
are physicians. She is a graduate of the H. Sophie Newcomb of Tulane University, with a master’s degree in painting from
the University of Alabama. Her works, primarily etchings, have been exhibited throughout the United States, including the Seattle Museum of Art,
the Detroit
Institute
of Art,
Smithsonian
Institution,
National
Academy of Design, the National Library of Medicine, and in many medical school facilities. Her etchings and drawings are in the perI
Department
AJR 158:518,
May Lesser (1927). Arterlogram Film. Hand-colored engraving, x 10 in. (From The Art of Learning Medicine, New York: Appleton-CenturyCrafts,
of Radiology, Mount Auburn Hospital, 330 Mount Aubum St., Cambridge, March
1992 o361-8o3x/92/1583-o518
C American
Roentgen
Ray Society
1974).
Private
MA 02238.
collection.
14
518
Medicine
The Art of Learning Stefan
Art
Medicine
C. Schatzki1
artist, May Lesser, went to UCLA She was allowed to attend the anatomy lectures and dissecting laboratory given to the first-year medical students. As she sketched the experiences that were new not only to her but also to the prospective physicians, she soon became accepted by the students and made friends with many of them. Lesser’s drawings and etching were so good and so sensitive to the complex interactions that were occurring during the first term, that the professor of anatomy suggested she go all the way through medical school as an artist with the class of 1971.
manent collection of a number of museums, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum, the Oklahoma Art Center, and the National Library of Medicine. She has recently published a new book ofetchings and paintings, AnArtist in the University Medical Center, documenting the activities of the Tulane University Medical
In the fall of 1967, a 40-year-old Medical School to study anatomy.
Center, where her husband
an insightful infrequently, way,
now teaches.
The etching reproduced here “shows the professor and his students examining the X-rays.” This work clearly captures the atmosphere of the decision-making process that goes on during the evaluation of films from a carotid artenogram, while at the same time preserving the artist’s subjective prerogative.
Many members of the faculty were extremely skeptical about having an artist participate in the students’ experiences, so during the next three and one-half years, Lesser relied on a variety of means to gain access to the different disciplines and experiences that make up the medical curriculum. Sometimes, faculty members who had experienced Lesser’s unique sensitivity to the learning of medicine introduced her to subsequent teachers. Occasionally, she would draw
this
in American
portrait of a professor and give it to him as a gift. Not her friends would simply take her to class with them. In she
spent
room,
laboratory,
special
sensitivity
four
X-ray
years
room,
sitting
in the
corner
of
the
lecture
emergency
room, conference room, and even at patients’ bedsides. Because each aspect of medical school was as new to Lesser as it was to the students, she was able to capture the experience with a unique freshness as well as with a to the experiences
that
students,
faculty
and patients were having. May Lesser recorded the heart of the educational
physicians,
process,
and
thus the soul of the new physicians as they progressed from the early hesitant moments in the dissecting room to confident, welltrained, independent fourth-year students. During her four-year tenure, she produced a huge body of drawings and etchings, over 300 of which were published in a unique book, The Art of Learning Medicine
(Appleton-Century-Crofts),
in 1974.
May Lesser is uniquely qualified to record the experience of learning medicine. Her father, brothers, husband, and three of her children College
are physicians. She is a graduate of the H. Sophie Newcomb of Tulane University, with a master’s degree in painting from
the University of Alabama. Her works, primarily etchings, have been exhibited throughout the United States, including the Seattle Museum of Art,
the Detroit
Institute
of Art,
Smithsonian
Institution,
National
Academy of Design, the National Library of Medicine, and in many medical school facilities. Her etchings and drawings are in the perI
Department
AJR 158:518,
May Lesser (1927). Arterlogram Film. Hand-colored engraving, x 10 in. (From The Art of Learning Medicine, New York: Appleton-CenturyCrafts,
of Radiology, Mount Auburn Hospital, 330 Mount Aubum St., Cambridge, March
1992 o361-8o3x/92/1583-o518
C American
Roentgen
Ray Society
1974).
Private
MA 02238.
collection.
14
