INVITATION TO WORKSHOPS – MAY 16th at UCL

Good news! UCL has received its public display licence from HTA and two workshops have been scheduled.

                          

Drawing Parallels: Artistic Encounters with Pathology is a collaborative interdisciplinary research project between Barts Pathology Museum, QMUL and UCL Pathology Collections. We aim to survey the attitudes of medical specialist and non-medical specialist audiences towards preserved foetal and neonatal specimens.

Where:
UCL, Rock Room,
Room 4
1^st Floor corridor,
South Wing,
Gower Street
UCL
WC1E 6BT

http://goo.gl/maps/RckEf

When:
SATURDAY MAY 16^th
MORNING WORKSHOP: 10:30 am – 12:30pm

 
AFTERNOON WORKSHOP: 2:30 – 4:30pm
Please note that spaces are limited.

Participants will see photographs, drawings and real specimens and engage with them through artistic methods. This is an opportunity for issues, concerns, opinions and ideas to be expressed and for specimens that have been hidden away or rarely used to have the chance to be seen.

We aim to provide a space where participants can discuss and engage with foetal and neonatal specimens.

By using this workshop to share opinions and engage with interesting specimens participants will help museums understand perceptions and reactions to the way specimens are maintained and displayed, improve how collections are used and promote the value of these unique specimens.

Light refreshments will be provided.

To RSVP your space please send your name and email address to  l.lyons@qmul.ac.uk
PLEASE SPECIFY if you would like to book a space for MORNING or AFTERNOON workshop.

UPDATE – workshops scheduled Saturday May 16th

As many of you know – Drawing Parallels came to a halt due to external factors. The following message was sent to the many participants who had signed up to be part of this exciting project. Here is the message they received:

“Dear Drawing Parallels Participant,

I am very sorry to inform you that the workshop you have signed up to attend as part of this project has had to be cancelled.

This is because UCL has not yet been issued with a Human Tissue Display Licence which will legally allow us to show you the specimens we had planned to during the workshops. Although we at UCL have been successfully inspected by the Human Tissue Authority as part of our application for the Display Licence, the process of issuing the actual licence will take much longer than we had anticipated. To avoid disappointing you further, we have decided to cancel the workshops outright, rather than reschedule them at this time.

We are, of course, very disappointed to have to do this and we apologise for the inconvenience this will cause you. Despite this setback, we remain committed to this project. It has highlighted how difficult it can be to share pathology collections like the ones in the project with public audiences, and it has confirmed our resolve to carry on.

We have been told that the licence will be issued over the course of the next couple of months and intend to reschedule the workshops in the new year. We hope that you will still want to join us when this happens, so please let us know by replying to this message if you are happy for us to invite you to the new workshops as and when they are scheduled.​ Thank you for your patience.”

I am please to say that UCL’s public display licence is now in place and there will be TWO workshops running. Both will be on Saturday 16th May, one at 10:30 – 12:30am  and another at 2:30 – 4:30pm. Refreshments will be provided.

Please contact me with your name and email address at l.lyons@qmul.ac.uk for further details.

 

Workshops – 10th September and 1st October

On September 10th I was joined by surgeons, pathologists and other medical professionals for another Drawing Parallels workshop. During the three hours there was a lot of silent concentration and followed by lively discussion about foetal and neonatal specimens and how they should be displayed and used.

.               

 “they are very useful for showing my students some of those diseases that affected the skeleton prior to the advent of disease modifying drugs.”

On October 1st participants came from different stages of training in medical schools for the last of the medical related workshops held at Barts. The students had not encountered specimens of this nature and were keen to explore drawing as a method for engaging with them in a way that allowed them to learn from them in a respectful way.

  

“I am very anxious that the ‘old’ path museums are kept since at the very least they are important historical documents and illustrate many diseases that are now no longer seen.”

     

About 70 drawings have been made by participants since June and these will be displayed on this blog soon.

 

 

 

 

 

Workshop 6th August

Once again it was a very hot day and the fans were on full at Barts Pathology Museum during our second 3 hour  ‘Drawing Parallels: artistic encounters with pathology’ workshop on 6th August. This particular workshop was aimed at midwives and nurses. Conversation was vibrant but there were also periods of intense concentrated silence as participants spent time engaging with prepared foetal and neonatal specimens from the collections. Many thoughts, suggestions and memories of experiences were sparked and discussion continued long after the workshop had officially ended.

    

Some things participants said:

“Drawing something is definitely a good way to ‘ be with ‘ something that you might not normally chose to be with or think about.  It’s like a bridge between you and that something.”

           

“Each time we saw the samples I felt I saw something different in them. It was also good to be able to interact with the other participants.”

             

Thank you to everyone who participated.

 

There are still places on some workshops. Please see which one seems most relevant to you and email l.lyons@qmul.ac.uk to book a place. (Please note, spaces are limited)

At UCL:

NOVEMBER 8th  – Others on Share academy list, med humanities, arts (NEARLY FULL)

NOVEMBER 15th – UCL & QMUL (other uni) support staff & hospital staff

DECEMBER 6th – UCL museum & Barts events list people, general museum goers (NEARLY FULL)

Workshop 2nd July

On a very warm afternoon specialists in medical museum conservation, specimen preparation, Assistant Pathology Technicians and medical museum curators travelled from near and far to participate in the first ‘Drawing Parallels: artistic encounters with pathology’ workshop at Barts pathology museum. During the three hour workshop they had opportunity to engage with prepared foetal and neonatal specimens in several ways with plenty of time for interesting discussions.

Thank you to everyone who participated.

There are still places on some workshops. Please see which one seems most relevant to you and email l.lyons@qmul.ac.uk to book a place. (Please note, spaces are limited)

Which workshop to attend?

4 workshops are for medical related groups and 4 for non-medical.

All run 1:00- 4:00pm

First 4 will be run at Barts and are aimed at medical related professions & trainees:

JULY 2nd  – Medical museum people, APTs, technicians (NOW FULL)

AUGUST 6th – Midwives & trainees and paediatric nurses

SEPTEMBER 10th – Surgeons, GPs, Pathologists and related medical professionals (NEARLY FULL)

OCTOBER 1st – Medical students – any year, any medical related field NOW FULL

 

The next 4 will be run at UCL and are for non-medical related and are aimed at:

OCTOBER 4th  – Museum workers and academics in other fields NOW FULL

NOVEMBER 8th  – Others on Share academy list, med humanities, arts (NEARLY FULL)

NOVEMBER 15th – UCL & QMUL (other uni) support staff & hospital staff

DECEMBER 6th – UCL museum & Barts events list people, general museum goers (NEARLY FULL)

 

 

Workshop 24th June

Thank you to everyone who attended the first Drawing Parallels workshop on June 24th. It was very interesting to hear everyone’s opinions and to share ideas.

Drawing notes – most recent

More visual notes

Before I embark on making one of the drawings used for the project I often make quick visual notes to help me pin point the areas of interest and to help me ‘think around’ the object. These notes are all made very quickly using pen.

 

 

Drawing parallels -drawing notes

Whilst working on this project I have been making drawing notes

   

 

With so many fascinating things to investigate in Barts pathology museum I find it useful to make quick visual notes to firstly survey, then review, then focus on the areas I wish to investigate more fully. These are some early pages and I will blog more soon.