Jessica in theatre
Temporary Exhibition - Close to the Bone: Patient Journeys Through Sarcoma
Please be aware this exhibition contains graphic images of surgery.
15th August–14th September 2024
Vincent Shinkwin, an electrical engineer and father of a young daughter, from Stevenage, who underwent treatment for bone cancer is featured in the exhibition Close to the Bone at the Hunterian Museum Gallery 14 August – 15 September. Copyright Caroline Seymour
It is an extraordinary privilege to see the necessary and life-saving reality of surgery. To see inside a fellow patient, to revisit my own experience as a sarcoma patient. It is a never-ending daily miracle that the body can experience such trauma and still continue to function. Caroline’s photographs are like classical paintings or graphic documentary images from a war-zone. Deeply, profoundly and harrowingly moving.
Bone cancer, or sarcoma, is a rare and aggressive form of cancer that affects 5,300 people a year in the UK. Close to the Bone is a series of powerful black and white photographs which document the experience of four patients (Gabor, Jessica, Vincent and Christine) with sarcoma, before, during and after surgery.
A diagnosis of cancer is one of the hardest pieces of news anyone can hear. Literally life changing. It is the beginning of a long journey, for which the destination cannot be predicted. Whilst the types of treatment – chemotherapy, surgery, radiotherapy – may be similar for many patients, each person’s response, how they are affected by each of the treatments, will be different. Cancer infiltrates, not just bone and tissue, but the lives of patients and their families.
Caroline Seymour’s photographs show rarely seen aspects of these journeys. In particular, the one part the patient can never consciously witness – the hidden world of the operating theatre, where surgical teams work with extraordinary focus, dedication and skill.
Artist Talks
Join photographer, Caroline Seymour, for a free talk about the making of the exhibition: Close to the Bone
Thursday 5 September, 1pm
This exhibition is a story from the patient’s perspective about their experience of diagnosis, treatment and follow up – the part that we, as clinicians, often do not see: the human side of the story. Caroline has brought the patients’ journeys to life in her black and white photography by capturing the thoughts, emotions, and feelings and by bringing out some of the subtleties of the complex work that we do.