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We all know famous artists, or at least can recognise a few names. Renoir, Van Gogh, Monet, Matisse, Edvard Munch, etc. We think of their paintings of fruit bowls, flowers, undressed ladies, and other subjects in their heavy frames, hanging in museums and art galleries, each with a price tag equivalent or more to a holiday in space.
We contemplate their art, but do we contemplate the artists? Their work must have been shaped by their lives, and therefore their health. As human beings, they must have suffered medical conditions, and you wonder if great works of art could have been influenced by the artist's illness. Following that vein, could art have been influenced by medicine, or the lack of it?
Claude Monet
Take for example, Monet. One of the leading figures in Impressionism, his was the hand that painted the water lilies series (1899-1908), which were done on huge canvasses in a specially built studio. The pieces we usually see in books, magazines, and cards are actually part of a huge all- encompassing painting, which surrounds the viewer. It was what he intended, as he was obsessed with light and colours and wanted to have flowers everywhere, all year round.
Monet had severe astigmatism, and was once fitted with a pair of glasses. "The world looks like that? I will paint no more!" he exclaimed, flinging them away. He later suffered from cataracts, and his failing eyesight is obvious in his later paintings (see the Japanese bridge in Giverny). The colours shimmer more, the subject becomes less focused, and yellow tones are used more liberally. As a result, the paintings look more surreal, as if seen through a haze of a dream. Monet underwent a cataract operation in 1922, but why he did not have it done earlier is unclear. One possible reason is that the postoperative period of recovery of sight was long, and he wanted to finish his project first.
Edgar Degas
An artist would be highly dependent on his sight, obviously. "Love is engendered in the eyes," according to Shakespeare. Well, so is art. If you cannot see you cannot paint. That does not mean that you cannot create. Degas was another artist afflicted with failing sight. His frequent themes were...