DermARTologie: das Inkarnat die Haut in der bildenden Kunst = DermARTtology : carnation skin in the fine arts

Abstract

"Art creates beguiling illusions for our senses, which cat­alyzes our brain into a sublime feeling of happiness. In the paintings of “Great Masters”, the viewer admires the whole painting and often overlooks details that are tracked down in the present book from several thousand works of art, clas­sified from the perspective of dermatology and interpreted comparatively with clinical pictures. Aging processes, moles, neoplasms, changes in skin appendages, connective and fatty tissue, vessels and nerves disturb the flawlessness of the in­carnate and were therefore - if at all - usually unconsciously depicted by the artist in the two-dimensional form of a por­trait without medical expertise. On the other hand, in the three-dimensional dermatologi­cal wax moulages, the pathological changes of the skin are deliberately depicted as realistically as possible with the best academic intentions. The attempt to explore parallels between skin representa­tions then and now shows that nothing has changed in the perfection mania and the striving for flawlessness of the in­carnate then as now and that the realistic representation is often sacrificed to the supposed ideal of beauty and every­thing pathological or abnormal is concealed."-- Back cover.

Contents

Das Inkarnat = Carnation -- Erkrankungen der Haut = Diseases of the skin -- Das Inkarnat in der dritten Dimension = The carnation in the third dimension -- Haut an Haut : Versuch einer Erkundung von Parallelen zwischen Hautdarstellungen einst und heute = Skin on skin : a loose exploration of parallels between skin depictions then and now.