Anatomy Day

Today I had the very great privledge of visiting the Anatomy Laboratory at the Uni as part of our School's workshop week. We were shown around the room, then set to work on watercolour paintings of the museum specimens and human subjects. Before I go on, these are photos not scans because I don't have a scanner at the moment, so they don't quite do their subjects justice.... but hopefully they'll give you some idea of how intricate and amazing the experience was.

Hat's off to all who donate their bodies to science. The medical profession and artists worldwide salute you.

This is the Circle of Willis. Someone had painstakingly removed all of the blood vessels that supply the brain and suspended them for study. They're incredibly delicate. Everyone thought that they looked like a rather lovely tree. Cherie brought along black paper (along with magnificent watercolour paper and paints) for us to play with. There was a gorgeous white ink there, which turned out to be rather shiny. It's not my most complicated drawing, but it's my favourite from the day.

This is the piece that I worked the most on, spent about four hours probably. Lots and lots of washes.

I'm starting to really love watercolour. Thinking it might just be my thing..... or one of them anyway. I love the way you can layer them.

This subject died of a brain embolism. You can see it as the black that surrounds (compresses) his brain, scary to look at, but also very beautiful.

A heart, or section thereof. This photo is close to the actual colours, but then I changed the settings....

and it became like this.... I really need to get a scanner.... haha i already said that didn't I :P

A lung. Don't smoke kids..... *cough*

So that was Anatomy Day. I loved it so much that I'm going again tomorrow instead of to the Sydney Gallery crawl. I have the itinerary anyways, so I'll just go later with Cas and Mum, spread it out over a weekend instead of a day.... all civilised like,

Better get to bed, it's hella late and I have a big day tomorrow.... and tomorrow night is the opening of the Margaret Olley exhibition at the NRAG OMGYAY!

-Emmeline