Tag Archives: Jean-Martin Charcot

Photographic Procedures at Charcot’s Salpêtrière

The stellar Remedia blog has featured a piece by De Montfort University Photographic History Research Center fellow Beatriz Pichel called The Backstage of Hysteria: Medicine in the Photographic Studio. In it, the introduction and development of medically oriented photography at Salpêtrière is surveyed, inverting the focus of from analyses of the produced images to the production thereof. Through emphasis on how “medical priorities, as well as the materiality and technical requirements of the photographic equipment, determined the kind of images taken, and the places in which they were taken,” Pichel the processes of mediation by which supporting evidence for medical theory were created. See here to read the article. 

“Disposition de l’appareil photo-électrique poire les études médicales”, Albert Londe, “La Photographie a la Salpêtriere”, La Nature, 1883. CNAM.

Workshop: Photography, Representation, and Therapy

italian workshopOn September 24 the University of Milano-Bicocca (Polo Historical Archive (PAST)), in collaboration with the Historical Archive of Italian Psychology (The Center ASPI), is hosting a seminar titled Fotografia e scienze della mente tra storia, rappresentazione e terapia (Photography and Mind Sciences History: Representation and Therapy).

The workshop will include talks on the role of photography in the works of Jean-Martin Charcot; the photo archive from Cesare Lombroso’s museum of criminal anthropology; the photographic story of 40 years at the Italian asylum Uliano Lucas; and the use of photo-art therapy as a means of investigation and treatment of mental disorders.

The meeting has been organized by Daniela Scala and will be held from 3:00 to 6:00 pm at Villa Di Breme Oven, Via Martinelli 23 in Cinisello Balsamo (MI).

Click here for the full program.