Visitors At This Museum Exhibit Can Touch The Art For Signs Of Breast Cancer
Video screenshot via David The Agency
To preserve the artwork, museums often caution the public against standing too close to exhibits or touching them. This showcase, on the other hand, isn’t so much about safeguarding historical pieces as it is about preserving visitors’ health.
For a limited period, guests at the Hispanic American Museum of Art Isaac Fernández Blanco in Buenos Aires were allowed—encouraged, even—to get touchy-feely with the paintings once a week, as part of an awareness campaign called The Art of Self-Examination.
Powered by Argentinian breast cancer nonprofit Macma and advertising agency David Buenos Aires, it had visitors feel for lumps, skin retractions, or swollen lymph nodes on figures of classical artworks.
Video screenshot via David The Agency
The showing featured replicas of Old Master artworks, and it’s worth noting that the symptoms weren’t blindly positioned on the characters’ chests. They corroborate with research published in The Lancet medical journal, along with studies by Dr Liliana Sosa, that detected evidence of breast cancer in the subjects of Rembrandt’s Bathsheba Holding King David’s Letter; Rubens’ The Three Graces; and Raphael’s The Portrait of a Young Woman.
Dr Sosa contributed her expertise to the recreations.
The creators had intended to host the show right at the advent of the pandemic but were forced to postpone it two years later, they told Muse by Clio.
Macma hopes that the tactile exhibition will reiterate the importance of regular self-checks while teaching the public to recognize symptoms of breast cancer. The red flags, after all, were right there all along and practically no one noticed them.
Accordingly, several museums in the country are also keen on displaying the art.
Video screenshot via David The Agency
Video screenshot via David The Agency
Video screenshot via David The Agency
[via Muse by Clio and Ads of the World, video and screenshots via David The Agency]
