Colored Printed Illustrations in Medical Publications 1500-1850

The works by Jacques-Fabien Gautier-Dagoty (1716–1785) are often considered to be the first anatomical color prints. However, hundreds of medical illustrations were actually printed in color in the preceding two centuries. Color in illustrations is rarely recorded in library catalogues or by book historians; art historical studies focus on single-sheet color prints; and studies in the history of medicine rarely consider the implication of color in illustrations.In these years, the same producers of printed materials used the same color processes for artistic prints and medical illustrations. Thus, this growing corpus can be identified and understood only using an interdisciplinary approach encompassing printmaking processes, art history, the history of the book and the history of medicine.

This talk represents Dr. Stijnman’s preliminary findings of systematic page-by-page analysis of tens of thousands of early modern (1450–1850) scientific publications. Concentrating on material produced in middle and Western Europe enables the exploration of how changing technologies determined the application of color. It traces the development of the role of color in medical illustrations from mere decorative use in sixteenth-century woodcuts to the identification of diseases by naturalistic coloring. Standardised uses of color emerged in eighteenth-century etchings and mezzotints, for example the depiction of arteries in red and veins in blue, but also that there were alternative color codes. In doing so, it lays out a new methodology for object-based, interdisciplinary research into book illustrations.

This event is co-hosted by the New York Academy of Medicine Library & The Guild of Book Workers, New York Chapter. The Guild Chapter wishes to thank Dr. Ad Stijnman and Ms. Arlene Shaner, Historical Collections Librarian of the NYAM Library.











When: Thu., Oct. 18, 2018 at 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Where: The New York Academy of Medicine
1216 Fifth Ave.
212-822-7200
Price: Free
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The works by Jacques-Fabien Gautier-Dagoty (1716–1785) are often considered to be the first anatomical color prints. However, hundreds of medical illustrations were actually printed in color in the preceding two centuries. Color in illustrations is rarely recorded in library catalogues or by book historians; art historical studies focus on single-sheet color prints; and studies in the history of medicine rarely consider the implication of color in illustrations.In these years, the same producers of printed materials used the same color processes for artistic prints and medical illustrations. Thus, this growing corpus can be identified and understood only using an interdisciplinary approach encompassing printmaking processes, art history, the history of the book and the history of medicine.

This talk represents Dr. Stijnman’s preliminary findings of systematic page-by-page analysis of tens of thousands of early modern (1450–1850) scientific publications. Concentrating on material produced in middle and Western Europe enables the exploration of how changing technologies determined the application of color. It traces the development of the role of color in medical illustrations from mere decorative use in sixteenth-century woodcuts to the identification of diseases by naturalistic coloring. Standardised uses of color emerged in eighteenth-century etchings and mezzotints, for example the depiction of arteries in red and veins in blue, but also that there were alternative color codes. In doing so, it lays out a new methodology for object-based, interdisciplinary research into book illustrations.

This event is co-hosted by the New York Academy of Medicine Library & The Guild of Book Workers, New York Chapter. The Guild Chapter wishes to thank Dr. Ad Stijnman and Ms. Arlene Shaner, Historical Collections Librarian of the NYAM Library.

Buy tickets/get more info now