0:00:09 > 0:00:11We are our bodies.
0:00:13 > 0:00:15We see the outside all the time
0:00:15 > 0:00:17but that's less than half the story.
0:00:17 > 0:00:20The surface, the exterior.
0:00:20 > 0:00:23We know far less about what's inside.
0:00:25 > 0:00:29Heaven forbid that we should actually see our insides.
0:00:29 > 0:00:31Most people go through their life without getting a look
0:00:31 > 0:00:33at their organs and for good reason.
0:00:33 > 0:00:37My lungs and kidneys and heart, and bones and muscles,
0:00:37 > 0:00:40arteries and veins - they do their jobs unseen.
0:00:41 > 0:00:44But for the anatomists, the doctors
0:00:44 > 0:00:48and artists who have struggled for centuries to understand how
0:00:48 > 0:00:53our bodies actually work, getting inside, dissection, was vital.
0:00:57 > 0:00:59In this five-part series,
0:00:59 > 0:01:01I'll be investigating the beautiful synthesis between
0:01:01 > 0:01:05discoveries in anatomy and the works of art that illustrate them.
0:01:07 > 0:01:09As a scientist myself
0:01:09 > 0:01:12and someone who is fascinated by anatomical images,
0:01:12 > 0:01:14I want to find out exactly
0:01:14 > 0:01:18how anatomy has inspired art and art anatomy.
0:01:21 > 0:01:24And it's going to be my privilege to see some of the greatest
0:01:24 > 0:01:26works of the art in the world.
0:01:28 > 0:01:31Unquestionably the most famous anatomical
0:01:31 > 0:01:34textbook in existence is Gray's Anatomy.
0:01:34 > 0:01:37Published in 1858, the accuracy of its descriptions
0:01:37 > 0:01:40and the beautiful clarity of its illustrations
0:01:40 > 0:01:43made it an instant bestseller,
0:01:43 > 0:01:48and more than 150 years later, it remains the most respected guide
0:01:48 > 0:01:51to anatomy that has ever been produced.
0:01:51 > 0:01:55The book was the result of the heroic efforts of two doctors -
0:01:55 > 0:01:59Henry Gray and his illustrator, Henry Carter.
0:02:00 > 0:02:03Henry Gray was 31 when he completed it,
0:02:03 > 0:02:05and his illustrator was just 27.
0:02:05 > 0:02:08At nearly 1,000 pages long, it was the most ambitious
0:02:08 > 0:02:11exploration of the human body yet attempted.
0:02:11 > 0:02:13So how did they do it?
0:02:13 > 0:02:16And why did the two men fall out while the book itself
0:02:16 > 0:02:21went on to become the iconic go-to authority on anatomy the world over?
0:02:39 > 0:02:42For centuries, anatomists have studied the human body,
0:02:42 > 0:02:46seeking new knowledge about how it moves and how it functions.
0:02:47 > 0:02:51Along the way, their work has been seen as a celebration
0:02:51 > 0:02:52of the handiwork of God
0:02:52 > 0:02:56and has informed the practice of both medicine and art.
0:02:58 > 0:03:03And at no time was this work more challenging than in the 19th century,
0:03:03 > 0:03:06when something momentous happened to anatomy.
0:03:09 > 0:03:13That something was the arrival of anaesthetic.
0:03:13 > 0:03:17Before this, surgery had been a risky and excruciating last resort,
0:03:17 > 0:03:21largely limited to superficial operations and amputations.
0:03:22 > 0:03:25Anaesthetic changed everything.
0:03:25 > 0:03:27It allowed surgeons to open up the living body
0:03:27 > 0:03:31and perform longer, more complex procedures.
0:03:31 > 0:03:34Procedures that demanded an encyclopaedic knowledge of anatomy.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39Henry Gray was an ambitious young man,
0:03:39 > 0:03:41and for him this was a call to arms.
0:03:41 > 0:03:45The book that bears his name is the one I'm going to look at now
0:03:45 > 0:03:47in the Royal College of Surgeons.
0:03:52 > 0:03:55Gray wanted his book to furnish students
0:03:55 > 0:03:57and doctors with the anatomical information
0:03:57 > 0:04:01they needed to perform successful surgery in this new era.
0:04:04 > 0:04:07The library here at the college has a first edition.
0:04:09 > 0:04:12So, this is it. This is the anatomist's Bible.
0:04:12 > 0:04:16The full title is "Anatomy - Descriptive and Surgical",
0:04:16 > 0:04:18which is a lot less pithy than how it's become
0:04:18 > 0:04:21universally known as, which is Gray's Anatomy.
0:04:21 > 0:04:25That title is based on a series of lectures that Henry Gray
0:04:25 > 0:04:30gave in the 1850s. And you can see the illustrator's name, Henry Carter.
0:04:30 > 0:04:33And the whole thing is based on the dissections that
0:04:33 > 0:04:36the two of them had done together.
0:04:36 > 0:04:38Published in London in 1858.
0:04:42 > 0:04:46Gray's Anatomy was original in its ambition which was to cover
0:04:46 > 0:04:49the whole of the human body in an affordable
0:04:49 > 0:04:52and accessible single volume for students and surgeons.
0:04:52 > 0:04:55Earlier anatomy textbooks had been too small,
0:04:55 > 0:04:58too large or too expensive.
0:05:00 > 0:05:04Turning the pages gives you a real sense of the scale
0:05:04 > 0:05:07of this project these two undertook.
0:05:07 > 0:05:13There are 989 pages and just look at the list of illustrations.
0:05:13 > 0:05:15There are so many and they are so varied.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18It is slightly unwieldy in that regard.
0:05:18 > 0:05:20The text gets slightly lost in these beautiful diagrams
0:05:20 > 0:05:23and they are beautiful. Here is an illustration of the bones
0:05:23 > 0:05:26of the left hand and the artist has shaded to give
0:05:26 > 0:05:30a sort of 3D relief to really understand how they fit together.
0:05:30 > 0:05:33All of this done within three years.
0:05:37 > 0:05:41These stunning illustrations are wonderfully precise.
0:05:45 > 0:05:48Carter has even avoided footnotes by skilfully integrating
0:05:48 > 0:05:51the labels into the drawings themselves.
0:05:51 > 0:05:54At times the artwork is reminiscent of the figures
0:05:54 > 0:05:58depicted by the 16th century anatomist Vesalius.
0:05:58 > 0:06:02But while Vesalius gave his bodies dramatic poses to
0:06:02 > 0:06:04illustrate their passage through a landscape,
0:06:04 > 0:06:07Gray and Carter were doing something very different.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13Here's another one which is a particular favourite of mine.
0:06:13 > 0:06:16It shows the veins and the arteries of the head and the neck.
0:06:16 > 0:06:19This position is shown
0:06:19 > 0:06:22because it's the best way to actually perform surgery.
0:06:22 > 0:06:24And if you turn back a couple of hundred pages you can
0:06:24 > 0:06:26see that this is exactly what Gray
0:06:26 > 0:06:30and Carter are doing in this illustration with the head
0:06:30 > 0:06:34and neck extended so you can see the exact point of the incision.
0:06:39 > 0:06:44Gray's Anatomy is an amazing exercise in heroic restraint.
0:06:45 > 0:06:50It's in cardboard covers. It's not a spectacular production.
0:06:50 > 0:06:53You open up the first edition of Gray
0:06:53 > 0:06:55and it goes straight into anatomy.
0:06:55 > 0:06:58There's nothing fancy going on. There are no landscapes.
0:06:58 > 0:07:02There's nothing outside the illustrations at all.
0:07:02 > 0:07:05So it's a very, very different enterprise
0:07:05 > 0:07:10and it's the first of the great heroic technical books which is
0:07:10 > 0:07:15basically saying, "I'm not doing style. I'm doing content."
0:07:24 > 0:07:28Now these are the original proofs for Gray's Anatomy,
0:07:28 > 0:07:29the so-called India Proofs,
0:07:29 > 0:07:32because they're printed on this very special paper called India paper,
0:07:32 > 0:07:36which is kind of thin and opaque and particularly good
0:07:36 > 0:07:39at rendering the exquisite detail
0:07:39 > 0:07:42of Henry Carter's beautiful illustrations.
0:07:49 > 0:07:52Carter's drawings of Gray's Anatomy are very spartan.
0:07:52 > 0:07:55They're almost in some ways austere.
0:07:55 > 0:07:59They've been compared, and I think quite rightly, to the kind of
0:07:59 > 0:08:04objectivity that we're familiar with in 20th century anatomical images.
0:08:04 > 0:08:07The idea of a very unmediated,
0:08:07 > 0:08:10clean, cool kind of mechanical objectivity.
0:08:12 > 0:08:17What they do very effectively is to communicate a particular
0:08:17 > 0:08:19kind of knowledge about the human body.
0:08:21 > 0:08:23If you're trying to teach anatomy,
0:08:23 > 0:08:26if you're trying to draw attention to particular aspects
0:08:26 > 0:08:29of the muscle structure or the functioning of the intestines,
0:08:29 > 0:08:32there's a certain amount of information you need to leave out
0:08:32 > 0:08:34because it's distracting.
0:08:34 > 0:08:39So what these drawings are, I think, is very functional.
0:08:39 > 0:08:44And I think that is a great tribute to Carter's skill as an artist.
0:08:54 > 0:08:57All of the illustrations in Gray's Anatomy were carefully
0:08:57 > 0:09:00designed to showcase the things that the reader
0:09:00 > 0:09:04most needed to know about the movement and anatomy of the body.
0:09:07 > 0:09:12So this pose is very much like one of the classic Gray's Anatomy poses,
0:09:12 > 0:09:15that it exposes a couple of muscles.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18This is the tip of the trapezius which is a back muscle
0:09:18 > 0:09:20and connects to the back of the skull there,
0:09:20 > 0:09:24but this one here, called the sternocleidomastoid, originates
0:09:24 > 0:09:27from the sternum, which is the breast plate here, and the clavicle,
0:09:27 > 0:09:29which is the collar bone here...
0:09:29 > 0:09:32What's interesting about this muscle here, the sternocleidomastoid,
0:09:32 > 0:09:35is that it pushes your head away when you turn your head
0:09:35 > 0:09:37rather than the other one pulling.
0:09:37 > 0:09:38So, if Amy looks square on,
0:09:38 > 0:09:42it's the one on this side pushing it in the other direction.
0:09:44 > 0:09:48The painstaking care Carter put into his illustrations conveyed
0:09:48 > 0:09:52this kind of information with a seemingly effortless simplicity.
0:09:52 > 0:09:55But it was all the result of hard graft -
0:09:55 > 0:09:58work that began with dissection.
0:09:58 > 0:10:00So ambitious was Gray's project
0:10:00 > 0:10:03that a vast number of dissections would be required,
0:10:03 > 0:10:06all to be carried out by Gray and Carter themselves.
0:10:09 > 0:10:12Gray and Carter were both doctors at St George's Hospital,
0:10:12 > 0:10:15which used to stand on the site of that hotel over there,
0:10:15 > 0:10:18the one covered in scaffolding, here at Hyde Park Corner.
0:10:18 > 0:10:20Gray had come to start his training as a whippersnapper
0:10:20 > 0:10:23aged just 15 years old.
0:10:23 > 0:10:25And he joined one of the best hospitals in London.
0:10:28 > 0:10:30There'd been a hospital here for over a century,
0:10:30 > 0:10:33but St George's had recently had a make-over
0:10:33 > 0:10:36and now boasted some of the finest doctors in London.
0:10:38 > 0:10:41The young Henry Gray was handsome,
0:10:41 > 0:10:44expensively dressed and fiercely competitive.
0:10:44 > 0:10:47At 19, he was winning prizes in surgery
0:10:47 > 0:10:50and by the time he was 23, his work was being read out
0:10:50 > 0:10:53to distinguished audiences at the Royal Society.
0:10:57 > 0:11:00Carter, meanwhile, was from a more modest background.
0:11:00 > 0:11:02He was born and raised in Yorkshire
0:11:02 > 0:11:04and couldn't afford to train as a physician,
0:11:04 > 0:11:07so he qualified as an apothecary-surgeon,
0:11:07 > 0:11:09what today we'd call a GP.
0:11:09 > 0:11:13Carter had all the ambition of Gray, but none of the self-confidence.
0:11:16 > 0:11:20Both men studied anatomy and learnt the art of dissection.
0:11:20 > 0:11:22But that took place around the corner.
0:11:26 > 0:11:30St George's dissection lab was located in nearby Kinnerton St
0:11:30 > 0:11:34not far from what was then Harrods Grocery.
0:11:34 > 0:11:38In November, 1855, Gray suggested that he and Carter should
0:11:38 > 0:11:40produce a "Manual for Students".
0:11:42 > 0:11:44Initially, Carter thought it was a good idea,
0:11:44 > 0:11:47but probably too much work for him to consider it.
0:11:47 > 0:11:50Even though Gray was pretty vague about his plans,
0:11:50 > 0:11:53Carter was quick to realise that the sheer number
0:11:53 > 0:11:56of dissections would be a huge undertaking.
0:11:59 > 0:12:03Carter was no stranger to this kind of endeavour.
0:12:03 > 0:12:05He had worked with Gray before on a book about the spleen.
0:12:05 > 0:12:08So eventually, despite his reservations,
0:12:08 > 0:12:12he agreed to collaborate on Gray's monumental new project.
0:12:13 > 0:12:16The truth was that Carter was struggling a bit.
0:12:16 > 0:12:19He didn't have Gray's connections. Gray had just been
0:12:19 > 0:12:22invited by the Duke of Sutherland to be his personal physician
0:12:22 > 0:12:25on his yacht on a round Britain trip.
0:12:25 > 0:12:28Carter belonged to a more down-to-earth set.
0:12:28 > 0:12:32He had advertised his services as a medical illustrator,
0:12:32 > 0:12:33but nothing much had come in.
0:12:33 > 0:12:35So the offer from Gray was a windfall.
0:12:42 > 0:12:45Right, so this is the site of the original anatomy labs.
0:12:45 > 0:12:47Gray and Carter would have come in here through these arches
0:12:47 > 0:12:50and the bodies from round the back.
0:12:50 > 0:12:54The dissecting rooms themselves had a huge glass barrel-vaulted ceiling
0:12:54 > 0:12:56to let in the maximum amount of light.
0:12:56 > 0:13:00But the whole place would have stunk of flesh-preserving alcohol
0:13:00 > 0:13:02and decaying human bodies.
0:13:05 > 0:13:08This extraordinary photograph shows students
0:13:08 > 0:13:12and lecturers in the St George's dissecting studio in 1860.
0:13:12 > 0:13:16Seated near the front, looking every bit the man in charge,
0:13:16 > 0:13:19is Henry Gray, and beside him lies a body for dissection.
0:13:20 > 0:13:24These men would have had a regular supply of body parts
0:13:24 > 0:13:25from the hospital up the road,
0:13:25 > 0:13:30but getting hold of a whole corpse was a different matter.
0:13:30 > 0:13:33Between the 1750s and the 1830s in Britain,
0:13:33 > 0:13:37the only legal source of bodies for dissection is the gallows.
0:13:37 > 0:13:42Under the terms of the Murder Act in the 1750s, the punishment for murder
0:13:42 > 0:13:46actually includes public dissection after you've been executed.
0:13:48 > 0:13:52The supply from the gallows is nowhere near large enough
0:13:52 > 0:13:56to meet the demands of this growing number of people studying anatomy.
0:13:56 > 0:14:00So in 1832, the government passes a new Anatomy Act.
0:14:00 > 0:14:02Under the terms of this act,
0:14:02 > 0:14:06a new source is found for bodies for dissection.
0:14:06 > 0:14:09These are the bodies of the poor.
0:14:09 > 0:14:11Essentially, if you die in a workhouse,
0:14:11 > 0:14:13under the terms of this act, and you are not claimed,
0:14:13 > 0:14:15you will be taken for dissection.
0:14:18 > 0:14:22What was once a hated and feared punishment for murder becomes,
0:14:22 > 0:14:25almost overnight, a hated and feared punishment for poverty.
0:14:27 > 0:14:31It's hardly surprising that human dissection had such a bad reputation.
0:14:31 > 0:14:35The Anatomy Act had been passed over the heads of protesters who had
0:14:35 > 0:14:39a deep mistrust of the anatomists, and a suspicion that it was their
0:14:39 > 0:14:43own poor relatives that would find themselves laid out on the slab.
0:14:45 > 0:14:49Because of this controversy, Gray and Carter had to be discreet.
0:14:49 > 0:14:52That's why they had the bodies delivered
0:14:52 > 0:14:53to the back door of the lab.
0:14:55 > 0:14:58It was here at Kinnerton St that many of Carter's
0:14:58 > 0:15:01meticulous illustrations were created.
0:15:03 > 0:15:07He also drew at home, often working well into the evening.
0:15:07 > 0:15:09At first, he drew on paper,
0:15:09 > 0:15:13and his designs were then engraved onto woodblocks for printing.
0:15:13 > 0:15:15But it was a slow process
0:15:15 > 0:15:19so he learnt the difficult technique of drawing reverse images straight
0:15:19 > 0:15:23onto the woodblocks themselves, saving both time and money.
0:15:26 > 0:15:30Gray's Anatomy, including all its 363 illustrations,
0:15:30 > 0:15:33was completed in July 1857.
0:15:34 > 0:15:38It was a remarkable accomplishment but it had come at a price.
0:15:39 > 0:15:41Gray and Carter had fallen out.
0:15:44 > 0:15:46It was hardly surprising.
0:15:46 > 0:15:48The two men had been working under enormous pressure
0:15:48 > 0:15:52for two and a half years, and all their work for Gray's Anatomy,
0:15:52 > 0:15:54all the text and all the drawings,
0:15:54 > 0:15:58had to be done alongside their day jobs.
0:15:58 > 0:16:02Looking at Carter's diary and the writing that he's had,
0:16:02 > 0:16:06it was clear that although he was very happy to work with Gray,
0:16:06 > 0:16:08from previous experience, he knew that Gray was very
0:16:08 > 0:16:11slow in paying, for example.
0:16:11 > 0:16:14He had done an enormous amount of work for Gray in his book
0:16:14 > 0:16:17on the spleen, which won an award.
0:16:17 > 0:16:20Carter was not acknowledged. Carter wasn't paid.
0:16:22 > 0:16:26In return for his work, Gray had promised Carter a monthly fee.
0:16:26 > 0:16:28It wasn't a king's ransom but it would help
0:16:28 > 0:16:30cover Carter's living expenses.
0:16:32 > 0:16:35Ultimately, Gray agreed to pay him £10 a month.
0:16:35 > 0:16:37Whether he did actually pay him, we're not sure.
0:16:37 > 0:16:41But certainly Carter complained that he was living on air
0:16:41 > 0:16:44and he was clearly annoyed at the way in which he was being treated.
0:16:44 > 0:16:47He worked incredibly hard for Gray.
0:16:51 > 0:16:55Feeling aggrieved and ill-treated, and still in need of cash,
0:16:55 > 0:16:58Carter decided to break with St George's
0:16:58 > 0:17:00and take his career in a new direction.
0:17:02 > 0:17:06He took and passed his exams for the Indian Medical Service, and accepted
0:17:06 > 0:17:11a post as Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at a college in Bombay.
0:17:11 > 0:17:14As he left for India, he could have had little idea of the blow
0:17:14 > 0:17:16that Gray was about to deal him.
0:17:20 > 0:17:24By now, the publishers had drawn up the proofs for the first edition.
0:17:24 > 0:17:26Gray's own notes on these proofs give us
0:17:26 > 0:17:31a very clear idea of how he saw Carter's contribution.
0:17:31 > 0:17:33I suppose the most significant evidence
0:17:33 > 0:17:37we have is the page proof of the first page of the first edition
0:17:37 > 0:17:41where Gray had made some very significant changes in ink
0:17:41 > 0:17:45to what Parker, the publisher, had prepared.
0:17:47 > 0:17:50What Gray has done is to strike out Carter's name
0:17:50 > 0:17:54and request that it's printed at a much smaller size, and he's also
0:17:54 > 0:17:58struck out the first line underneath Carter's name which says that
0:17:58 > 0:18:02Carter has just been appointed Professor of Anatomy in Bombay,
0:18:02 > 0:18:06so that the only indication that the reader would have of Carter's post
0:18:06 > 0:18:08is Late Anatomy Demonstrator, St George's.
0:18:08 > 0:18:12So he has taken every effort that he can on the title page to demote
0:18:12 > 0:18:15and downgrade Carter's significance in the book.
0:18:17 > 0:18:20Well, as it happens, the publishers did come up with a compromise
0:18:20 > 0:18:23but without consulting either of them.
0:18:23 > 0:18:26Henry Carter didn't get his job title in India,
0:18:26 > 0:18:30but the typeface in which his name appears is larger than Gray wanted.
0:18:30 > 0:18:34Though, admittedly it is certainly smaller than Gray's.
0:18:40 > 0:18:43The two men never collaborated again.
0:18:43 > 0:18:46Carter made a great success of his career in India.
0:18:46 > 0:18:50He identified a new fungal disease and advanced medical understanding
0:18:50 > 0:18:53of diseases like leprosy, malaria and tuberculosis.
0:18:53 > 0:18:56But for Gray, success would be short-lived.
0:19:01 > 0:19:04This is 8 Wilton Street, in London's Belgravia,
0:19:04 > 0:19:07just a stone's throw from the dissection rooms.
0:19:07 > 0:19:10Henry Gray lived here with his mother and he also died here,
0:19:10 > 0:19:15in June 1861, of smallpox, aged just 34.
0:19:17 > 0:19:21What Gray and Carter had achieved was extraordinary.
0:19:21 > 0:19:24The most comprehensive account of anatomy in Western history.
0:19:27 > 0:19:29The medical journal, The Lancet
0:19:29 > 0:19:32said that there wasn't "a treatise in any language, in which the
0:19:32 > 0:19:36"relations of anatomy and surgery are so clearly and fully shown".
0:19:43 > 0:19:46Gray's Anatomy became THE standard thing.
0:19:46 > 0:19:49There were other textbooks in Germany and America,
0:19:49 > 0:19:54but even on a worldwide basis, it became Gray's Anatomy.
0:19:54 > 0:19:56It had that kind of authoritative ring,
0:19:56 > 0:19:59so it kept selling and selling and selling.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04Gray's Anatomy is now in its 40th edition
0:20:04 > 0:20:08but it is no longer the book that Gray and Carter created.
0:20:08 > 0:20:11As technology has advanced our knowledge of the body,
0:20:11 > 0:20:15it has been repeatedly revised and added to, with extensive
0:20:15 > 0:20:19new text and hundreds of new illustrations, with the result that,
0:20:19 > 0:20:25at times, it seemed in danger of losing its visual coherence.
0:20:25 > 0:20:28What happens with these great books
0:20:28 > 0:20:31and textbooks is you get successive editors come in
0:20:31 > 0:20:34and you've got the original thing and they say,
0:20:34 > 0:20:37"We need to do a bit of this and we need to do a bit of that."
0:20:37 > 0:20:40So there is a phase in the development of these books
0:20:40 > 0:20:47where the original is still there but it's become corrupted in a way.
0:20:47 > 0:20:49It's lost its unity.
0:20:49 > 0:20:52It's lost its sense of what its central purpose is.
0:20:54 > 0:20:57This is one of the reasons why Susan Standring, the editor in chief
0:20:57 > 0:21:03of the 39th, 40th and 41st editions decided that after nearly 150 years
0:21:03 > 0:21:07of changes, Gray's Anatomy needed a major overhaul.
0:21:09 > 0:21:14So what did you decide to do in order to revamp Gray's?
0:21:14 > 0:21:17Well, the 39th edition, we revised mostly the text
0:21:17 > 0:21:19with some illustrations up to date.
0:21:19 > 0:21:23The 40th edition we concentrated on the illustrations.
0:21:23 > 0:21:28So there is a house style when we have our own bespoke diagrams.
0:21:28 > 0:21:31What you're seeing is what the anatomist,
0:21:31 > 0:21:33the clinician wants you to see.
0:21:33 > 0:21:37It's bringing to the forefront the elements that you need.
0:21:37 > 0:21:39And that visual style, is it something that's evolved from
0:21:39 > 0:21:42the previous editions, or have you returned to the source
0:21:42 > 0:21:44and used those Carter images as a template?
0:21:44 > 0:21:47No, the only Carter image that I retained in the 39th was a little
0:21:47 > 0:21:48tiny one of the developing sacrum
0:21:48 > 0:21:51but I had to get rid of that for the 40th edition.
0:21:51 > 0:21:54- Why?- Because it was really so old-fashioned.
0:21:54 > 0:21:56It just didn't look right.
0:21:56 > 0:21:58You have to go with the times, I think.
0:21:58 > 0:22:00In fact most of the images now,
0:22:00 > 0:22:03or many of the images are just that, they're images, MRI, CT.
0:22:06 > 0:22:09The major thing that's new is that we have a very large
0:22:09 > 0:22:11online component and that allows us
0:22:11 > 0:22:13not only to add additional text in the form of
0:22:13 > 0:22:19commentaries, but all manner of 3D imaging that we couldn't add before.
0:22:19 > 0:22:22They're all ways of trying to inform the reader.
0:22:22 > 0:22:26Anatomical text is very dense. It's not boring but it's dense
0:22:26 > 0:22:31and it needs something to help the reader understand and appreciate
0:22:31 > 0:22:34the relationships, and how better to do that than with images,
0:22:34 > 0:22:38and if those are moving images and animations, that's even better.
0:22:38 > 0:22:43Gray's Anatomy's transformation from a textbook of drawings
0:22:43 > 0:22:47based on first-hand dissections, to an encyclopaedia of the most
0:22:47 > 0:22:53up-to-date diagrams, X-rays, scans and photographs seems to encapsulate
0:22:53 > 0:22:56the changing relationship between art and anatomy.
0:22:57 > 0:23:02In the past, artists and anatomists, from Leonardo Da Vinci,
0:23:02 > 0:23:05to Andreas Vesalius,
0:23:05 > 0:23:07to Henry Gray,
0:23:07 > 0:23:09they all had to perform their own dissections
0:23:09 > 0:23:12to discover and record knowledge about the human body.
0:23:17 > 0:23:20But the invention of new forms of medical imaging means that artists
0:23:20 > 0:23:23can now gather all the information they need
0:23:23 > 0:23:26without getting their hands on corpses.
0:23:28 > 0:23:32Today, Richard Tibbitts is the lead artist on Gray's Anatomy.
0:23:32 > 0:23:35It's his job to take all this knowledge and imagery
0:23:35 > 0:23:39and create the next generation of the book's illustrations.
0:23:41 > 0:23:43You talk to anybody about medical illustration,
0:23:43 > 0:23:47from all walks of life, and everybody knows Gray's Anatomy.
0:23:47 > 0:23:51The chance to bring it forward for future generations of medics
0:23:51 > 0:23:53to learn from is just a fantastic opportunity.
0:23:56 > 0:24:00Our drawings, eventually somebody will read the text
0:24:00 > 0:24:04and hopefully gain the information from our drawings
0:24:04 > 0:24:07that will further them in their medical career.
0:24:16 > 0:24:20Gray's is still a gorgeous feast of anatomy
0:24:20 > 0:24:22and detailed medical knowledge,
0:24:22 > 0:24:25but I'm left wondering whether, now more than ever,
0:24:25 > 0:24:29it represents the end of traditional anatomical art.
0:24:29 > 0:24:33Did art and anatomy part company a long time ago?
0:24:38 > 0:24:42Or is it just that the traditional relationship has changed?
0:24:42 > 0:24:46Draw quite a confident scale, if you would, on your paper,
0:24:46 > 0:24:47and really give these curves...
0:24:47 > 0:24:51Eleanor Crook is a 21st century anatomical artist.
0:24:51 > 0:24:56She teaches students how to create their own anatomically themed art.
0:25:00 > 0:25:03But she's also part of the scientific community,
0:25:03 > 0:25:06making anatomical models to be used in medical schools
0:25:06 > 0:25:07all over the country.
0:25:09 > 0:25:13Eleanor, do you see your work as being more educational or artistic?
0:25:13 > 0:25:15What is the relationship between the two of them?
0:25:15 > 0:25:19Well, I see myself as a sculptor first and foremost.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23And a lot of what I do has accurate anatomical information in it
0:25:23 > 0:25:25that people could learn from.
0:25:25 > 0:25:28But when I'm making it, I'm really thinking about it as an artwork.
0:25:31 > 0:25:35This piece you're working on now is very much like a Vesalius,
0:25:35 > 0:25:37the 16th century anatomist.
0:25:37 > 0:25:40Even some of the muscles that you've removed,
0:25:40 > 0:25:43that's something that Vesalius does a lot in the Fabrica.
0:25:43 > 0:25:45Is that one of the key influences?
0:25:45 > 0:25:50Yes. That depicting of the flayed man as still alive,
0:25:50 > 0:25:52and in a sense helping to show off his anatomy.
0:25:52 > 0:25:54He wasn't the first to do that,
0:25:54 > 0:25:58but that's one of the things that makes his book so memorable.
0:25:58 > 0:26:01How do you see anatomical art these days?
0:26:01 > 0:26:05Has there been a split, the two separated, anatomy, art?
0:26:05 > 0:26:08I would've said yes 15 or 20 years ago.
0:26:08 > 0:26:11But I think particularly the rise of new imaging technologies
0:26:11 > 0:26:15for the body have given artists a completely new field to work within.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18There's a very great number of contemporary artists working
0:26:18 > 0:26:22with microscopic imagery, or scanned imagery.
0:26:22 > 0:26:25Do you think that is a renaissance of...
0:26:25 > 0:26:29well, of the actual Renaissance, and the study of the body at that time?
0:26:29 > 0:26:31Do you think we're coming back to that
0:26:31 > 0:26:33sort of sensibility of thinking about the body?
0:26:33 > 0:26:36I think I would feel comfortable describing it that way, yes.
0:26:36 > 0:26:38- A new renaissance.- Mm.
0:26:45 > 0:26:50Today, technology is pushing anatomical artwork in new directions.
0:26:51 > 0:26:55Artists are engaging with the body at a cellular level
0:26:55 > 0:26:57and exploring its hidden fabric,
0:26:57 > 0:27:01creating art that is inspired by microscopic imagery, scans and DNA.
0:27:02 > 0:27:06While the source material may have changed, they are still
0:27:06 > 0:27:10working with anatomy and are extending its artistic potential.
0:27:10 > 0:27:12It's a new chapter in the long
0:27:12 > 0:27:16and fruitful relationship between anatomical investigation and art.
0:27:21 > 0:27:23In this series, I've been able to explore
0:27:23 > 0:27:26over 600 years of anatomical art.
0:27:29 > 0:27:33Along the way, there have been ground-breaking discoveries,
0:27:33 > 0:27:36medical breakthroughs, and a fair few controversies.
0:27:36 > 0:27:39But for me, one thing stands out from it all.
0:27:39 > 0:27:42Whether they were motivated by a desire to depict
0:27:42 > 0:27:47God's handiwork or to understand the science of the body,
0:27:47 > 0:27:51these anatomists and artists all believed passionately that
0:27:51 > 0:27:55only by seeing for themselves could they uncover the truth.
0:27:58 > 0:28:02They were like the great explorers who discovered new continents
0:28:02 > 0:28:03and mapped them.
0:28:03 > 0:28:06And in recording their knowledge and discoveries, they have left us
0:28:06 > 0:28:10with a gallery of wonderful art that still has enormous value
0:28:10 > 0:28:14even if some of the features depicted are no longer thought to be correct.
0:28:17 > 0:28:21The beauty of anatomy is that there is always something new
0:28:21 > 0:28:25to discover about ourselves and something amazing to illustrate.
0:28:25 > 0:28:29Anatomy has at times been politics, sometimes theology,
0:28:29 > 0:28:33and often theatre, but it has always been an art.