UNIVERSITY OF THE WITWATERSRAND, JOHANNESBURG

Art for Medical School

The establishment of an art collection for Medical School started in 2006. At the opening of the first installation, the then Dean, Professor Price, posed the question: Why an art installation in the foyer of Medical School? He went on to say that the Adler Museum of Medicine already holds very popular annual art exhibitions as part of its temporary exhibitions programme. These are: Expressions of art competition for students and the ADCO Health Profession Art Society exhibition. The Board of the Adler Museum of Medicine had extended this thrust in two ways: by commissioning a small number of artworks for the foyer, preferably using the Museum?s collection as part of the artwork or installation, and by establishing an art space in the Museum. Selection is limited to artists producing work which will be of specific interest to health sciences students, school learners and the general public in a museum of this nature. Artists dealing with health and relevant social issues would be invited to exhibit their work.

The intentions of this initiative are: to enhance the foyer of Medical School by the installation of appropriate contemporary artworks by South African artists; to increase the prestige of the Faculty; to ensure wider access to many more objects than can be accommodated in the Museum itself by increasing the number of objects displayed; to open the Museum and the campus to a wider audience as the works of art/installations would be of a quality which would attract people in the cultural milieu, thereby increasing the visibility of the Museum and Medical School; enrich the perspectives of medical and other health professions students through seeing cogent and poignant work by artists of high calibre, thereby enhancing their understanding of contemporary art-making in this country and encourage creativity and different perspectives among the students.

The collection will be developed in the following ways:

  1. By commissioning artists to produce works of art using the Museum?s collection as part of the artwork or installation or soliciting relevant artworks from artists
  2. By inviting artists to exhibit their work in the Adler Museum. Selection is limited to artists producing work which are of specific interest to health sciences students, school learners and the general public in a museum of this nature. Exhibitions are tailored around the undergraduate teaching programme of the Faculty, or artists dealing with health and social issues.

The Faculty welcomes donations of relevant works of art for the collection. Please contact the Museum Curators on 011 717 2081 or email: adler.museum@wits.ac.za.

An example of an artwork we would like to acquire:

Mapping Our Lives

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ASRU - University of Cape Town

BODYMAPS PROJECT

Mapping Our Lives: A Post-Treatment Rollout Initiative

Now that the long-awaited treatment roll-out has begun, ASRU s research and outreach agenda has shifted to a concern with the social context of AIDS. In particular, we are interested in exploring the social forces which affect people s decisions to disclose their HIV-status to others, and which affect their ability to adhere to long-term treatment. In this regard, the A-team s Mapping Our Lives initiative is proving to be an important site of learning. Mapping Our Lives workshops take place in support groups and are designed to encourage critical reflection on the social context facing participants, and their responses to it. The workshops are both informed by, and in turn inform, social science research.

This Mapping Our Lives initiative is best known for producing life-sized body maps . A-team members take their own body maps to support groups to talk about their experience of illness, treatment, and disclosure. They then show the participants how to make their own body maps. In addition to this form of art/narrative therapy, the Mapping Our Lives initiative also includes workshops on social maps and journey maps to stimulate critical discussion about the social challenges posed by HIV/AIDS.

Approximate cost: R15 000

Donor's name will be displayed alongside the work of art