Physician's artwork is an outgrowth of patient care

Some 28,000 pills woven into fabric give museum visitors a different take on medicine's connection to life.

By Myrle Croasdale, AMNews staff. Jan. 19, 2004.

Dr. Elizabeth Lee, a general practitioner in Bristol, England, says medicine is her first love, but a close second is the art she creates with lifelong friend and textile artist Susie Freeman.

"Medicine defines me. Art is a sideline," says Dr. Lee, who has been practicing medicine for 17 years and creating art for more than five. "Being a doctor is a great thing."

Art may be a sideline for Dr. Lee, but it has made her a celebrity. She and her collaborators Freeman and photographer and video artist David Critchley now have an exhibit at the British Museum.

Their work, "Cradle to Grave," combines prescription drugs, family photos and personal artifacts to illustrate the medical care given during an average person's lifespan. To put a personal face on the concept, the fictional lives of an 82-year-old woman and a 76-year-old man are depicted.

The museum, home to Easter Island figures, Roman statues and the like, received 4.6 million visitors in 2002-03. "Cradle to Grave," exhibited in a waist-high display case more than 40 feet long, dominates the middle of one of the museum's galleries.

"My favorite part is at the very beginning," Dr. Lee said. "We have a lineup of all the immunizations a child has by the age of 4. There are nine syringes and needles. It's quite devastating thinking of this tiny person getting all these injections, how they go through this pain to be protected. I love the look of them."

Another favorite is the section that deals with the man's death. A length of fabric with 14,000 prescription pills he's taken during his life suddenly becomes blank when he dies of a stroke.