The Struggle with Normalcy

During my placement at the George Marshall Medical Museum, I got the chance to curate an exhibition. The theme is the struggle with normalcy; how people throughout history have defined normality and its consequences.

In the first week I had to decide what theme I wanted to work with. For inspiration, I read a few historic books from the GMMM’s collection. One book was titled ‘the story of plastic surgery.’ It was written in 1952 and it told an interesting story about how plastic surgery has evolved from prehistory until the 1950s. The author seemed to believe that striving for perfection and a normal appearance would become the ultimate goal of the plastic surgeon. I think that he was right and I wanted to confront people about it. Many of the people who come to the Charles Hastings Education Centre, which houses the GMMM, are doctors, nurses or other medical professionals - a very interesting audience for this kind of exhibition.

Various surgical tools and other items. 

Normality is not only related to appearance and plastic surgery. Normal behaviour and mental health are closely related. There were interesting stories about women being declared insane in the Victorian era for doing or saying things that were not normal. For example, a woman who wanted a life outside the domestic sphere would be labelled as hysterical. We have objects in the collection of the GMMM that are related to mental health such as the Powick Hospital Digest, ECT equipment and articles on LSD trials. For the plastic surgery story, I assembled a surgical set for a minor cosmetic operation. The operation was removing a benign tumour from the upper arm. I did this together with Mrs Margaret Ingman, a volunteer at GMMM who was a great help. I hope she enjoys seeing the objects in the case.

Before installing new exhibition

I had to take down the previous exhibition as well. That was pretty cool because I hadn’t done anything like that before. The objects of the previous exhibition were all loans so I went through the process of returning the objects to the owner and doing all the necessary paperwork. Afterwards, I cleaned the case. There was a lot of wax stuck on the case. That is where problem solving skills come in handy; with a ruler I got everything out.

Normality is not always negative. It is a great tool for diagnosing illnesses, either physical or mental. I wrote about this in the informative texts that go with the exhibit. Finally, I wanted to do something that would attract attention to the case. It is made of glass so Louise suggested I write on it with a white glass marker. The texts I wrote are all lines from the historic books or from literature. Source material included the short novel ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and ‘the Bell Jar’ by Sylvia Plath.   

Check out the Museum's Temporary Exhibitions page to find out more.

Finished product will be on show at GMMM until the new year.

Lauren Romijn, MA student placement, University of Leicester 

What happened when we gave the museum to Year 5 Class for #TakeoverDay?

With #TakeoverDay happening November 18th, here's a repost of a blog we wrote for Museums and Heritage Advisor about our experience of giving The Infirmary to pupils from Dines Green Primary School in June.  

There are pros and cons to being a university venue. We are a small cog in the giant wheel of University of Worcester's growing ambition however we do try to contribute in our way. One huge benefit, literally comes when students go home in June! Having competed their exams, assessments and end of term parties we can use more of the old hospital building for events and activities without fear of disturbing classes, studying or experiments. 

Object handling time. 

We took full advantage of this space in June when we invited Dines Green Primary School to lead the first ever Takeover Day at The Infirmary. Year 5 picked up the challenge and over the course of four days they visited the building, played in the galleries, learned about the characters from the 231 year history and used objects to become acquainted with the history of medicine. Through these activities they absorbed the history and pulled out the important facts for the area like; the founding of the British Medical Association (and what that meant to the patients and doctors of 19th century), what leeches were used for, Matron Mary Herbert’s persuasive skills to build a nurses home for the 150th birthday fundraising scheme. 

Students also helped take photos for social media!

They then invited their parents and Year four students to visit the museum and all 25 children from Year 5 contributed to the visit; leading tours, speaking about the rooms, characters, object handling and even taking photos on the day. The whole day was handed over to the Year 5 children who were now experts! Finnley Murray, aged 10 said, "I was able to teach people about what doctors and physicians did in history. It was interesting to know and share.”

"I was amazed to see how eager the children were to takeover the museum. From day 1, where we visited the museum, to day 4, where the children took total ownership of the tours, everyone was thoroughly engaged and motivated in the history of the infirmary. They absorbed even the finest of details, to ensure they were able to deliver the tours to their parents and other school members effectively. What a great day, and a great experience for the children!" Lucy Taylor, Year 5 Teacher at Dines Green.

The annual Takeover Day is 18th November, we ran ours on the 16th of June because the building was empty and received super support from Kids in Museums because we all know everyone loves a sticker and a certificate!    

Harrison Hill and Mitchell Stevens, aged 10 said of the experience, "I really enjoyed learning about the history of the infirmary. I loved that we were able to share our knowledge with the community of Dines Green."

If any museum is on the fence about doing it, we highly recommend taking the plunge. It was hard work and a little scary handing control over, however we think the class loved it, as the quotes show and we heard lots of happy children at the after party on the day. The school has already signed up for 2017 so I guess, the teacher also enjoyed being taken over!    

Found in the archive

These newspaper clippings have been found in the archive.

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OUT OF THIS MIND: MATTHEW OULD-ORAM EXHIBITION PART 2

Mark showed me pictures of a previous project in which wallpaper was hung against the blinds that cover the windows of the gallery. I thought it was a great idea to create posters for six poems and to have them cover the blinds. I wanted to decorate the posters with pictures that are related to medical science so I spent a few days searching in the database of Wellcome Images.

Jigsaw of poster created in actual size

Several images were selected. I found a great lithograph from an anatomy atlas that would become part of all the posters. After that, I had to sort out the copyright license. As long as I put a notification in the posters, it was fine so I continued by designing the posters in Publisher. Mark showed me the colours that are used by The Infirmary museum in its branding guidelines. I used these colours in my design for the posters. For font, I chose Courier New because it matched with the history of the building; courier looks like the font of an old-fashioned typewriter. Font size depended on the size of the posters. Designing the posters was a challenge due to the copyright, the different sizes and editing the picture. In week five we were finally able to send the posters to the printer of the University of Worcester. The biggest posters were 260 by 120 centimetres.

Mark wanted me to use the community case in the corner of the gallery. At the time, it featured works by poet Sipho Eric Dube. I decided that the case would include one of the seven chosen poems. The community case was a great, little project for me. I sketched my ideas first and then we had to do a bit of altering. I came up with the idea to make a brain of steel wool with paperclips and red thread that represents the veins. Matthew’s poems would flow out of the brain and spill out of the case, onto the floor. As the poem flowed out, its font would become bigger and more disruptive which represents the growing chaos of psychosis.

Steel wool purchased

50% of the way there ironing!

For this exhibit, I chose the poem ‘Controlled by Electricity and a Bush.’ It tells how Matthew has a psychotic episode in an electronics store. Although this would be a very dramatic story, Matthew tells it in a very dry, matter-of-fact tone which shows how this is a normal part of his life. I thought that was very touching. I got all the materials from Worcester’s city centre shops and spent two afternoons surrounded by steel wool and threads. The end result looks very good.

The most difficult part was getting the poem onto a cloth. I figured that this was the best way of conveying my idea of a story ‘spilling out’ of someone’s brain. The poem had to be printed out on transfer paper which had to be purchased via Amazon. The poem had to be printed in reverse and it took a few hours to figure out how to do that. Then we needed an Inkjet printer which was much harder to come by than expected. In the end, I could use the printer of the George Marshall Medical Museum. My colleague Zoe could provide us with an iron. Finally, I got to iron the poem onto a piece of cotton in week six. It took me an entire morning and a couple of hours in the afternoon. In the end, my knees hurt and the cloth was burned at a few places but it looks really nice. A few pins were needed to tuck in unneeded pieces of fabric. The community case is now finished with an accompanying text and a few finishing touches. It is difficult to open the community case by myself and I needed Lewis to help me with lifting it up. In the end, it all worked out fine.

This project required me to have problem-solving skills. In week seven we heard from the printer that the posters were too big. Thanks to everything I had learned before, it was really easy to redo the posters in a suitable size. We were able to hang the posters in my final week.

Lauren Romijn, MA student placement, University of Leicester