Five hundred years of medicine in art

"The Clements C. Fry Collection is among the largest and most comprehensive collections of art related to the history of medicine. Housed in the Historical Library of the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale, its two thousand prints and drawings span five centuries and represent the works of over six hundred artists, among them Pieter Bruegel, Rembrandt van Rijn, Thomas Rowlandson, James Gillray, Honore Daumier, and Kathe Kollwitz." "The collection surveys the general, non-didactic historical iconography of medicine and health care. Doctors visiting their patients, satires of therapeutic fads, polemics on vaccination, temperance propaganda, anatomy in art, childbirth scenes, hospital facades, and images of disease are among the scores of subjects significantly represented. The many examples of satire number almost one thousand. The collection also reflects the professional interests of Dr. Fry, a Yale psychiatrist, bringing together many works related to mental illness, including representations of patients, psychiatric institutions, and therapeutic practice." "This researched and organized volume makes available an important collection of prints and drawings and