Does Illness Influence Art? 11/1/01
Zardos
>
>
>There is more to life than your stupid Mercedes,
yeah, there a popular singers of the day.
>so pull your head out
>of your ass!
>
>
>On Fri, 2 Nov 2001 08:05:45 -0800, "LyndaANP/GNP"
><TurnOnTheSpotLight@Brighter> wrote:
>
>>
>>LyndaNP <Lyn...@nc.rr.com> wrote in message
>>news:1f26krm.c1xvbn9ng3agN%Lyn...@nc.rr.com...
>>>
>>>
>>> From:
>>> http://www.healthscout.com/printerFriendly.asp?ap=1&id=100875
>>>
>>> Does Illness Influence Art?
>>>
>>> Disease often marks work of great geniuses, expert says
>>>
>>> By Neil Sherman
>>> HealthScout Reporter
>>>
>>>
>>> TUESDAY, Aug. 15 (HealthScout) -- Vincent van Gogh placed a foxglove
>>> flower in front of Dr. Paul Gachet when he painted a portrait of the
>>> homeopathic doctor in 1890. During the last months of his life, van Gogh
>>> had sought help for epilepsy from Gachet.
>>>
>>> Van Gogh's reference to foxglove, from which the drug digitalis is
>>> derived, provides insight into his medical condition at the time, says
>>> Dr. Paul Wolf, a professor of pathology at the University of California,
>>> San Diego. Too much digitalis, which van Gogh was taking, creates a
>>> penchant for the color yellow.
>>>
>>> Wolf, who studies how illness impacts the lives and creations of the
>>> world's famous painters, composers, writers and political leaders,
>>> talked about those effects to the annual meeting of the American
>>> Association for Clinical Chemistry last month.
>>>
>>> "Why van Gogh had a propensity to the color yellow hints at a
>>> progressive toxic state," Wolf says. "In his famous painting, Starry
>>> Night, there are yellow circles around the stars. And that's a symptom
>>> of an overdose of digitalis. Gachet tried digitalis to try and clear up
>>> van Gogh's epilepsy, and it didn't work."
>>>
>>> Yellow wasn't the only thing van Gogh loved.
>>>
>>> "Van Gogh did have epilepsy, but that could have been due to the fact
>>> that he drank a lot of absinthe, and absinthe has a poison which affects
>>> the brain -- wormwood," Wolf says. "The poison causes the nervous
>>> system's cells to fire at will and so, in reality, van Gogh may have had
>>> toxic epilepsy due to absinthe."
>>>
>>> Van Gogh also had "a strange obsession with eating strange things. He
>>> liked to taste his paints and drink turpentine. We think these various
>>> toxins may have wreaked havoc with his vision and his thinking
>>> processes," Wolf says.
>>>
>>> But while Wolf thinks illnesses have had profound effects on the lives
>>> of creative geniuses, he still believes no one will ever understand what
>>> really makes an artist tick.
>>>
>>> "Van Gogh and Beethoven, for instance, were manic depressives, and the
>>> idea that melancholy is associated with creativity goes back to Grecian
>>> times. You don't have to be a manic person to be creative, but there is
>>> a higher incidence of creativity in these kinds of people. Ultimately
>>> creativity is a mystery, unknowable," he says. "You may be able to
>>> ascribe genius and creativity to the chemistry of the brain and to the
>>> genes, but it's not the whole story, only part of it."
>>>
>>> Wolf also speculates the condition that caused Ludwig van Beethoven's
>>> deafness, Paget's disease, affected the composer's creativity and
>>> productivity.
>>>
>>> "Beethoven thought he went deaf because his father used to beat him
>>> severely and caused brain damage and damage to his auditory nerve, but
>>> Paget's disease not only caused deafness in Beethoven, it caused him to
>>> get depressed, and it caused him to be an alcoholic. Paget's disease in
>>> Beethoven cut off his productivity," Wolf says.
>>>
>>> Paget's disease is a chronic disorder that typically results in enlarged
>>> and deformed bones, according to the National Institutes of Health. The
>>> most common bone disease in the United States, it can cause pain,
>>> deformities, hearing loss and can limit activity.
>>>
>>> Wolf says Beethoven's depression also may have been the wellspring of
>>> his inspiration.
>>>
>>> "The loneliness of the deafness and its resulting depression could have
>>> expanded, in some way, his musical inspiration. When you are very manic
>>> you have a flight of ideas, and when you are depressed you don't create
>>> anything. You may need both sides to be an artist," he says.
>>>
>>> One art historian doubts the usefulness of such speculation.
>>>
>>> "How van Gogh saw, or whether he had yellow visions, or whether he
>>> sucked the paint out of his brush, all these things are very speculative
>>> and tend to represent the need of the physician who proposes these
>>> things on the basis of their medical expertise and not the basis of the
>>> extant literature," says Aaron Sheon, an art history professor at the
>>> University of Pittsburgh.
>>>
>>> "To my mind, the artist, to some extent, believe in their specialness.
>>> But that's probably not any different than the myriad of millionaires in
>>> Silicon Valley. What you have is a human being who adapted to his
>>> physical situation rather than surrendering to it," Sheon says.
>>>
>>> What To Do: For more on artists and manic depression, see the Food and
>>> Drug Administration or the Depression and Related Affective Disorders
>>> Association .
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> SOURCES: Interviews with Paul Wolf, M.D., clinical professor of
>>> pathology, University of California and the Department of Veterans
>>> Affairs Medical Centers, San Diego; Aaron Sheon, professor, department
>>> of art history, University of Pittsburgh, Pa.; July 26, 2000, American
>>> Association for Clinical Chemistry meeting presentation
>>>
>>> Copyright © 2000 Rx Remedy, Inc.
>>>
>>> Last updated 8/15/2000 12:00:00 PM.
>>>
>>> -------- End Forwarded Message --------
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> LyndaNP
>>> Reality isn't the way you wish things to be, nor the way
>>> they appear to be, but the way they actually are.
>>> - Robert J. Ringer
>>
Zardos.
Is it to be or not to be,
Why ask me ?
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