It’s easy to confuse anatomising, an autopsy, and surgery. Here’s a guide to their different readings, with some of the finest example paintings.
Gervex
Works from 1880, in which his style became looser and possibly more Impressionist. Or was he still a Naturalist?
For painters, hospital medicine was spectacle, and its doctors actors on a stage. As time progressed, artists and doctors looked more closely at the patient.
An emaciated corpse in a morgue, a notorious nude rejected by the Salon, and a busy day in the couturier: his choice of motifs was very broad.
