Incubator imaginaries
For Anne Whitehead, the NICU incubator raises questions of precarity and resilience, and illuminates care as a layered series of interactions involving human and non-human agency.
Heart Excavations
Artist Sofie Layton works with medical data to give physical form to personal narratives of maternal loss and bereavement. This post describes the process of creating Excavations, a performative work that explores a mother’s grief at having lost a young child to cancer.
Creating bonds with a baby expected to die at birth
This personal essay by Tamarin Norwood charts the months of late pregnancy following a terminal prenatal diagnosis, when an unexplained congenital condition led to oligohydramnios: the depletion of amniotic fluid necessary for foetal lung development.
Perspectives on Child Loss: Two Case Studies from Eighteenth Century Midwives
Rebecca Simpson offers an alternative perspective on stillbirth and infant-loss, focussing on the writings of two eighteenth century midwives. This is one of a series of essays addressing miscarriage, prematurity, stillbirth and neonatal loss, published by The Polyphony to coincide with Baby Loss Awareness week, which runs 9-15 October every year.
The Silent Epidemic of Stillbirth: how to break the taboo?
Adinda van ’t Klooster reflects on a decade of making artworks that explore the stigma of stillbirth. This is the first in a series of essays addressing miscarriage, prematurity, stillbirth and neonatal loss, published by The Polyphony to coincide with Baby Loss Awareness week, which runs 9-15 October every year.
Contagious! Visiting an Exhibition on Epidemic Diseases
What do objects from a bygone age tell us about epidemics today? Since opening in June, the exhibition Contagious! reflects on the history of pandemics, including patients’ painful experiences, coping and containment strategies, and examples of ground-breaking medical research. Ruben Verwaal reports on his recent visit.
Becoming an Image
Being a patient today increasingly means being an image. Liz Orton’s new artist’s book, Every Body is an Archive, takes the medical image as a site of critical enquiry to explore questions of ownership, language and power within the clinical encounter. Polyphony editor Fiona Johnstone met with Liz Orton to talk about the book, the centrality of image-making to medical practice, and how right now is a radical moment for the clinical gaze.
(Not) Looking at Historical Medical Images
How do researchers respond to the politics, ethics and emotions raised by archival medical images? Michaela Clark reviews the workshop ‘Emotions and Ethics: the Use and Abuse of Historical Images’, organised by AboutFace, 17 June 2020.
Muzzles, parrots and lifejackets: the uneasy objectification of the face mask
As lockdown eases and face coverings become mandatory in certain situations, Harriet Barratt uses object relations theory to consider the emotional responses that the mask engenders.
Learning how to listen
Megan Griffin explores how the listening skills gained as a professional musician have benefited her practice as a medical doctor.