perjantai, 24 elokuun, 2012, 12:55

The cancer cells of a nun deceased in 1970 come to life in Mental Alchemy

In autumn you can freeze other things besides berries and mushrooms, too. In hundreds of medical research institutes around the world, there are conserved cancer cells of a nun who died in 1970. These cells are brought back to life for confocal microscopy.

So does every now and then also researcher Kirsi Rilla of the University of Eastern Finland, who says: “One of the dangerous properties of cancer cells is their resistance to death, but this property can be made good use of for research purposes.” She goes on: “With the knowledge we have nowadays we no longer regard cancer as a single disease, but as a family of highly idiosyncratic diseases for which there is no one correct form of treatment.  Also, there are medical scientists who believe that the human mind has a considerable influence over the state of health of the whole body, even though there is no foolproof means of demonstrating this.”

3D photograph from the series Mental Alchemy.

Kirsi Rilla writes about an image of the Mental Alchemy artwork: “To my mind the treating of disease is the main theme combining science and art that emerges from this painting. My own work is concerned with finding new treatments for cancer diseases, and I am very well aware that working with tiny molecules can sometimes cause one to forget what the research is really intended to achieve. Thus the image inspires me to look at my work afresh and reminds me that I am really capable of making visible what the eye cannot see.”

Jaana Partanen

Avainsanat: Mental Alchemy