The art of healing

This provincial exhibition was the first major exhibition in Austria to focus on medicine. It offered an overview from ancient medicine to monastic medicine, from epidemics to modern surgery. The art of healing also includes pills and ointments, which is why a great deal of space was devoted to presenting the extraction and processing of medicinal plants through the ages as well as modern methods of pharmaceutical technology.

The aim of this state exhibition was to “convey facts and connections to anyone interested in medicine, enabling them to recognize the dependence of medicine, medical practice and contemporary hospital medicine on political, economic, social and technological influences in comparison with the conditions of earlier times and to draw conclusions from this,” according to exhibition curator Manfred Skopec. The exhibition was also intended to show that the art of healing is ultimately about caring for health and curing illness.

The medical layman hardly knows how much surgery has developed over the centuries until, in the 19th century, it was “taken out of the realm of pure craftsmanship and, as an academic science, reached the standard that we all take for granted today” (Skopec).

Franz Schuh, son of the Ybbs town organist, turned surgery into a science in Austria.Schuh, who was open to all things new, performed the first ether anesthesia in Vienna in 1847, shortly after its discovery. General anesthesia with ether and chloroform became the most important prerequisite for major surgical procedures from the middle of the 19th century.

The exhibition, for which more than 250 domestic and foreign lenders provided exhibits, covered everything from the surgical instruments of Roman times to medical care and nursing provided by monasteries, the activities of village surgeons, bathers and wound specialists, right through to the most modern operating theatres for transplants.

Among other things, anatomical wax models, old pharmacy equipment and depictions of patron saints were on display. In a herb garden, visitors could find out about the most important medicinal herbs, what they look like, where they grow and how they work. Curious facts from the history of medicine were also on offer: Who knew, for example, that ants were once used to close surgical wounds?

The venue of the provincial exhibition, the Gaming Charterhouse, was founded in 1330 by the Babenberg Duke Albrecht II and was abolished in 1782. Melk Abbey sold the almost dilapidated charterhouse to the architect Walter Hildebrand in 1983. By the time the provincial exhibition opened, 70 million schillings (the equivalent of 5.1 million euros) had been invested in its renovation.

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