UNITED KINGDOM:"SAVING FACES" EXHIBITION IS PROJECT BY ARTIST MARK GILBERT AND SURGEON IAN HUTCHINSON INTO REHABILITATION OF FACIAL SURGERY PATIENTS

Record ID: 527014

  • Title: UNITED KINGDOM:"SAVING FACES" EXHIBITION IS PROJECT BY ARTIST MARK GILBERT AND SURGEON IAN HUTCHINSON INTO REHABILITATION OF FACIAL SURGERY PATIENTS
  • Date: 1st March 2002
  • Summary: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM (MARCH 1, 2002) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) SMV PAINTING ON WALL SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English) MARK GILBERT, ARTIST, SAYING "Many times when I was working on the paintings they would tell me about their worries and the things that they were anxious about , at other times there may be anxieties with the treatment and maybe at times I could go to the surgeons
  • Embargoed: 16th March 2002 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz,Environment,Health,Quirky
  • Reuters ID: LVA9UD1EM7XI3DIZBP3Z1BFP2Y8O
  • Story Text: A powerful exhibition of paintings of patients undergoing facial surgery is currently on display at the National Portrait Gallery. "Saving Faces" is the joint initiative of surgeon Iain Hutchison and artist Mark Gilbert and offers the general public a glimpse of what process patients who had facial surgery go through.
    The "Saving Faces" exhibition displays portraits of thirty patients who have had to undergo facial surgery due to cancer or severe injuries to their faces.
    The exhibition is the result of a collaboration between leading surgeon Iain Hutchison and acclaimed Glasgow artist Mark Gilbert.
    During a residency at St Bartholomews and the Royal London Hospital, Gilbert painted patients undergoing facial surgery for cancer or deformity and patients who had suffered severed facial injuries from car crashes, shotgun wounds or assault.
    These portraits interpret the patients' physical appearance before, after and, occasionally, during their corrective surgery.
    "The face after all is what we show to the world. It's what we're judged on and how we judge others and it's very difficult if you have cancer affecting the face. Of course you have the fear of cancer but then you have the fear of the treatment", says Hutchison.
    Since the completion of the portraits, psychologists have studied the effects of the works on the sitters. Patients with facial deformity can have problems coming to terms with psychological factors affecting them.
    Psychologists have noticed that surgery transforms them emotionally and their true character and psychological potential is released form the constraints of their pre-surgical facial appearance.
    It was the result Hutchison had hoped for.
    "I thought that the painting process, actually sitting for the artist, talking and then sitting for the final product, might have a beneficial effect", he says.
    "Many times when I was working on the paintings they would tell me about their worries and the things that they were anxious about , at other times there may be anxieties with the treatment and maybe at times I could go to the surgeons themselves and say maybe so and so is anxious and so in that respect I was a kind of go-between", says artist Mark Gilbert.
    Roland Scott is one of Hutchison's patients. He was diagnosed with cancer and had to undergo surgery. He says, the paintings helped him to come to terms with what happened to him and to make clear to others what he went through.
    "Mark was my therapist - any problems, we would sit and chat while he was painting. yeah it was great", he says.
    Another one of Hutchison's patients is Chris Pavlou. Chris was attacked by a gang of men and beaten up so severely that he was almost left for dead.
    "I didn't think there would be any psychological effect on me. There obviously is because I now see the painting every year. I get down about wintertime and it's a great reminder that I am still alive and that I've got nothing to worry about.", he says.
    The exhibition runs at the National Portrait Gallery until 21 April 2002.
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