JOLLY DAYS

Sickness Is All

Ever wondered what doctors talk about at cocktail parties? Their theories about art. Except they have no real education in art, only the demanding experience of a medical education — an education which often leaves out interpersonal skills I might add — so…

This article attempts to explain the effects of diseases and other human maladies on the creative work of great artists. The MD author goes so far as to claim that the art works themselves are metaphorical expressions of the diseases. This is a familiar genre that is periodically resurrected because sophomoric theorizing is just too delicious to let die; here it manifests itself by an attempt to explain talent, genius, by some negative contrivance; the artists weren't really gifted, they were pathologies to be studied like bugs under a microscope. Their work, well, those are symptoms, like the Sistine Chapel.

This scientism, as former Senior Editor of Scientific American John Horgan describes speculations which masquerade as science, like string theory, is implemented with a “may be” followed by an assertion based on this self-same verbal quicksand:

[Michelangelo] might also have been exposed to lead-based paints. The fruit acids of wine, chiefly tartaric contained in crocks, are excellent solvents of lead in crocks coated with lead glaze. The wine thus contained high levels of lead.

I'm sure the doc is correct that, ” The afflictions these people endured probably could have been ascertained and perhaps treated with modern medical techniques.” Assuming they were correctly diagnosed at a distance of time, space and circumstance that boggles the mind. Whether those maladies expressed themselves in their work or were rather a human triumph of spirit over affliction isn't in question for me.