24 Hour Museum - official guide to UK museums, galleries, exhibitions and heritage
Gateway to Over 3,000 UK museums, galleries and heritage attractions
Skip to navigation
Exhibitions
Portraits Of Six Women Surgeons Go On Show At The Royal College Of Surgeons
By Marian Cleary
22/07/2008
Image: Photograph of a woman standing in front of a portrait
Phyllis George FRCS - the first woman to be elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. © Jane Brettle
Exhibition preview: Six Women Surgeons at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, Lincoln's Inn Fields until December 1.
A visit to the Royal College of Surgeons of England building in Lincoln's Inn Fields is always an exercise in respect. While visitors to their magnificent free Hunterian Museum wander through, members of the college and staff go about their business.
Looking down on all this are the portraits of the many people who have made the surgical profession what it is. Not least among them, John Hunter himself whose anatomy collection forms the basis of the Hunterian Museum itself.
Image: Photograph of a woman in a medical setting
Linda de Cossart FRCS - vascular surgeon and Vice-President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. © Jane Brettle
Those who have shaped the work of the college, which in its present form dates from 1800, were quite naturally immortalised on canvas in various artistic traditions down the years and today the college has hundreds of portraits in its care.
However, a new exhibition aims to show that over the last century things have begun to change and there is now something missing from the collection. This missing element - eminent female surgeons.
Simon Chaplin, Director of Museums for the college, has this as central to the reasoning behind the latest commission:“It is important that the college’s collections develop to reflect the changing nature of the surgical profession.”
Image: Photograph of a woman holding a piece of medical equpiment
Anne Moore FRCS - neurosurgeon and served as Vice-President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 2005 to 2008. © Jane Brettle
The commission was given to photographer Jane Brettle and aims to begin to plug the gap and change the public face of surgery to better reflect the fact that today in some medical schools over 70% of the intake is women.
Inspiration for Brettle's honorific portrait photographs come from the work of neo-classicist, Ingres (1780 – 1867) in their composition, scale and colouration. These are not the soft images of women for which he is famed however. Brettle takes her lead from his male portraiture of status and formality.
The commission also takes its inspiration from Brettle’s own 2003 exhibition ‘airside’, in which she took women at the forefront of their professions and depicted them in their work settings but not in their uniforms. Works from this collection are now on show at National Galleries of Scotland and City Art Centre, Edinburgh.
Image: Photograph of a woman in front of a stuatue
Professor Averil Mansfield CBE FRCS - retired vascular surgeon, first female Professor of Surgery in the UK and Vice President of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1998 to 2000. © Jane Brettle
Six Women Surgeons at the Royal College of Surgeons is not about women doing – it is about women being. Being at the top of their profession and central to its development and depicted in large-scale full-length or three-quarter length portraits.
Shown either within college spaces or holding the equipment central to their work, the links to the many other portraits created down the years heralding the sitters’ skills and status is clear.
This is not however merely an exercise in historical homage. As Simon Chaplin says: “Too often, portrait collections are seen as purely historical. We believe that our portrait collection is an active resource and one of the best ways of demonstrating how surgery is evolving.”
Image: Photograph of a woman in front of some medical equipment
Leela Kapila FRCS - retired paediatric surgeon and served as Vice-President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 2003 to 2004. © Jane Brettle
All six women have played a part in shaping their profession, they have also been central to the activities of the college itself. The choice of both retired and practising surgeons also gives an indication of the initial pioneering that brought women into the profession.
Phyllis George, for instance, was the first woman to be elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England back in 1979 while Linda de Cossart, is a practising vascular surgeon and is currently Vice-President of the College.
The legacy of the past is however apparent in the use of the college as a context for some of the portraits. For instance, John Hunter is there in the background in two of the pictures, whilst new innovations at the college are also used to show the future. For instance, Leela Kapila stands in front of the college’s new Wolfson Surgical Skills Centre.
In marking the work of these women with these portraits, the college is acknowledging that time shapes but also changes any institution. It also demonstrates a commitment to this change.
Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons
Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons of England , 35-43 Lincoln’s Inn Fields, London, WC2A 3PE, England
T: 020 7869 6560
Open: The Hunterian Museum is open Tues-Sat 10.00-17.00 Admission is free and the museum is open to all.
All groups must book in advance.
Admission is free. A donation of £3 per person is encouraged.
Closed: Sun-Mon, Bank Holidays, Good Friday and Easter Monday, 24 Dec 08 to 5 Jan 09
National Museums Scotland
Edinburgh, EH1 1JF, Lothian, Scotland
Related Articles
Hunterian Museum Exhibits Drawings Of Rare Disease
News In Brief - Week Ending July 27
Funding Boost For Conservation Of WWI Facial Injury Portraits
China Now - A UK-wide Celebration Of Oriental Culture
News In Brief - Week Ending March 30 2008
News In Brief - Week Ending March 16 2008
National Museums Scotland In New Partnership With Shetland
E-news registration
E-mail story to a friend
Tell us what you think
Wildlife Photographer of the Year At Natural History Museum
Future 50 - Top Online Axis Artists In Leeds Exhibition
Yoko Ono Takes Her Love To Tyneside For BALTIC Show
Shetland Museum Unveils Evocative First World War Collection
Sisley In England And Wales At London's National Gallery
Darwin And His Big Idea At The Natural History Museum London
Babylon: Myth Or Reality? At The British Museum
The Hub's Guitars, Made In Britain, Played All Over The World
Interactive Map Explores Coastal Communities At Jaywick, Essex
The Post Office During WWI At The Cabinet War Rooms
St. Barbe Museum Hosts The Women's Land Army - A Portrait
Oliver Clegg's Night's Move At The Freud Museum London
New Walk Museum Hosts Ernest Gimson & The Arts And Craft Movement
Paths To Fame: Turner Watercolours From The Courtauld
National Portrait Gallery - Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer's Life
Disposable People - Slavery Exposed At Southbank Centre
Soho Of The 1950s And 1960s At Photographers' Gallery
Eileen Agar: An Eye For Collage At Pallant House Gallery
Search this site
Home Page
News Page
Exhibition Page
What's On
Trails Page
Website of the Week
Letters Page
Welsh Home
Graphical Version
Copyright © 24 Hour Museum
Information published here was believed to be correct at the time it was prepared. Welsh language pages developed with CYMAL: Museums Archives and Libraries Wales, funded by the Welsh Assembly Government.