"Biopsy of the Human Soul": - A Microscopic View -

Abstract

For a creative final in my medical humanities class, I wanted to depict a portrait of what I believed the human soul would look. At first I wanted to just represent what the soul of a provider who embraces the concepts of what I learned in my medical humanities class but then I realized that everyone sees and interprets art in their own way, so I wanted to give people the chance to feel or realized the soul through their own eyes. I used a lot of calming colors like deep blues and purples and some bright colors like pearly white and gold because I believe that my "soul" recognizes a soul who embraces medical humanities as very calm yet bold and confident with their colors. My idea was to first show a background that represented the chaos and feelings that the soul of a healthcare provider may go through and then I thought maybe the soul would be sphere like with light vibrant colors to show the beauty and purity of a soul but my idea kind of transformed into another route because I wanted to basically go "into" the soul so to speak so now I painted my portrait of the soul in almost a microscopic view, as if you took a biopsy and viewed the soul that way. I got this idea after watching “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks”, when John Hopkins gave the daughter of Mrs. Lacks a microscopic view of HeLa cells, which are her mother’s cells. Being able to see the cells bright, vibrant, and thriving, it was like it brought Henrietta Lacks back to life for her daughter. I think souls are a very complex being to understand but I believe that everyone’s souls are different and completely unique to them. My portrait in a sense almost looks like a galaxy, which I did not intend for that initially to happen but after observing my finished product I remembered that some people believe that the stars are our souls guiding us from above or even the souls of those who have passed and I thought that went perfect for an end result.