1856 SURGICAL ANATOMY Groin Femoral Artery Vein Nerve Maclise (SA-28)

MACLISE, JOSEPH

About this Item

1856 - Large original antique lithograph published for SURGICAL ANATOMY by Joseph Maclise and published by John Churchill, London in 1856. Overall size approx 49cm x 34.5cm (19.3in x 13.6in) including margins. Condition is excellent. These engravings will be shipped rolled in an art/poster tube.Joseph Maclise (1815andndash;1891), a talented and truculent surgeon, anatomist, and medical illustrator of mid-nineteenth-century Britain. Maclise left behind a corpus of brilliant, idiosyncratic anatomical images, and opinionated commentaries, but almost no evidence of his social interactions or affective relations. Homoerotic desire was heavily policed in Maclises time. Given the conditions under which the archive was created (or suppressed, or lost, or shamed into reticence), we can never know with certainty what he intended or felt, or what his readers receivedandmdash;but we do have a rich evidentiary base of visual materials. Using narrative history, close readings of images and texts, detailed comparisons with other illustrated anatomies, and open-ended theoretical and methodological approaches (a mash-up of queer theory, Foucault, gaze theory, genre analysis, and contextualization)andmdash;an argument is joined: a book can be a closet and a queer space. Maclises drawings, ostensibly designed to contribute to the improvement of medical knowledge, theory, and practice, show good-looking young men and cadaveric bodies in various states of dissection. Penises, testicles, anuses, faces, sensuous hands on skin are crisply rendered in illusionistic perspective, with a highly cultivated aestheticismandmdash;often without any relevance to the anatomical topic discussedandmdash;and little attention is paid to the female body. In historical context, and from our twenty-first-century vantage point, the hypothesis of homoerotic investment leads to productive interpretations. This article poses more questions than answers but comes to rest with this: it is plausible and meaningful to take Maclises anatomical illustrations, and the figures depicted therein, as queer objects of queer desire.Antique Paper Company are a long established family business selling original antique prints, maps engravings as well as many other paper antiques such as original vintage Decorative Posters, Ephemera, Stamps Postal History, Manuscripts, Antiquarian Books much more. We are always looking to buy and have up to andpound;500,000 in immediate funds available. We are looking for exceptional single items, better collections, original archives, Atlases, Libraries, accumulations etc and have previously purchased from Major Institutions, Libraries, Collectors, Solicitors many other sources. We are happy to travel almost anywhere in the world for the right opportunities. So please do get in touch if you are considering selling your Antique Paper collectables. Seller Inventory # SA28-4991181

Bibliographic Details

Title: 1856 SURGICAL ANATOMY Groin Femoral Artery ...