Early Modern Art and Science: Simulation of Dissections in the 16th Century Fugitive Sheets

Abstract

During the 15th century the study of anatomy became a part of art education. With the rise of anatomy as a branch of medicine, artists began to play an important role in the process of anatomical research, creating graphic representations that served as powerful transmitters of knowledge. Among these, the most exquisite were anatomical fugitive sheets, the volumetric, three-dimensional representations of human anatomy. The layering, overlapping, of human organs, enabling one to manipulate them according to need, serves as simulation of the strategies of opening of human body during anatomical dissections. The artists-illustrators of these processes introduced new didactic interactive methods into acquisition and transfer of knowledge. In close cooperation with scientists, they found ways to translate information into recognizable and accessible models, endowing them with cognitive structure, as in anatomical atlases by Andrea Vesalius, De humani corporis fabrica (1543), and Johann Remmelin, Catoptri Microcosmici (1609).