Visual Arts and Medicine in Early Modern Europe and Beyond - A Collection of Essays and Sources

This book opens up new perspectives on the relationship between art, medicine, and science in late-medieval and early modern Europe. Looking beyond the traditional nexus of art, anatomy, and optics, the volume sheds light on a broader array of connections between artists and physicians: collaborations between painters and doctors on colour charts, handwork skills common to sculptors and surgeons, the transmission of art theory through medical texts long before the emergence of art writing itself as an independent genre, and the kinship of medical diagnosis with early modes of connoisseurship. Reconfiguring the histories of art, medicine, and science, the book also traverses conventional boundaries between physical and mental health, religious and medical modes of healing, menial and exalted forms of knowledge and labour, as well as vernacular and scientific understandings of human difference, including gender, race, and neurodiversity.

About the author

Robert Brennan is Lecturer in in Italian Art, c. 1300-1500 at the Courtauld Institute of Art at the University of London

Fabian Jonietz is a scholar at the Central Institute for Art History, Munich

Romana Sammern is a permanent postdoctoral scholar at the interuniversity organisation 'Arts & Knowledges' of the University of Salzburg/Mozarteum University

Product details

• Authors: Robert Jonietz Brennan
• Assisted by: Brennan Robert (Editor), Fabian Jonietz (Editor), Romana Sammern (Editor)
• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 10.02.2026
• EAN: 9781526182876
• ISBN: 978-1-5261-8287-6
• No. of pages: 328
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Art > Art history; European History, MEDICAL / History, ART / Subjects & Themes / Human Figure, History of Medicine, History of Art, History of Science, 17th century, c 1600 to c 1699, 16th century, c 1500 to c 1599, History of art & design styles: c 1600 to c 1800, Human figures depicted in art, ART / Movements / Renaissance, ART / Movements / Baroque & Rococo, Human figures depicted in the arts