The Patient
James Hayward
In creating this piece I was heavily influenced by the painting ‘Portrait of Picasso’ by Salvador Dali. The painting also seemed reminiscent of the concept of ‘the patient’, and it is this idea that led me to create a piece that is my own.
This painting represents the ‘biomedical’ view of the patient – a mechanical being to which we apply the knowledge we have gained from books and attempt to treat with all manner of medications. In doing so, the patient is no longer human – but a rather distorted and unfamiliar being.
Whole Person Care – Year One
Well done! Really moving piece
This is a really interesting piece because it shows a human face but distorted to look instead more like a machine than a human and highlights the issue of doctors treating a patient and behaving as though they are simply a jigsaw puzzle that needs to be solved by applying what they memorised from textbooks in med school instead of treating a patient.
This piece for is very powerful – initially I was shocked by the scary looking figure but it was only after reading the description that I fully appreciated the message James was trying to convey. It raises a very interesting point about what the priority of healthcare professionals should be – to cure the patient as quickly and efficiently as possible, or to give the patient the emotional support as well as the scientific knowledge? It also raises a contentious point about the current healthcare system; with increasing strain and reduced funding, healthcare professionals aren’t given enough time and support and treat their patients as individuals and instead are forced increasingly to a robotic system where patients are merely problems that need to be solved. The colours used, dark reds and yellows, exaggerate the idea of patients being problems as red is usually associated with danger and when the patient’s whole body is red, it connotes evil figures such as the devil. When healthcare professionals are put under more and more strain, is it their patients that take the blame?