14 October 2008

Taking inspiration from Wellcome Collection’s rich archive, ‘Clarke's Cabinets of Cures’ by Mark Clarke is a series of mismatched cabinets with fascinating stories to tell.

Each cabinet is created from disparate reclaimed fabrics and everyday products to reveal a series of surreal moments in medical history. An intriguing cast of characters emerge, from the Crimean War heroine Mary Seacole to the Spanish Countess of Chinchón seeking a cure for malaria.

Clarke’s Cabinets of Cures: 14 October 2008-25 January 2009
Private view: Wednesday 22 October 2008, 19.00 (contact Mike Findlay for details)
Tickets: FREE of charge. No need to book.
Venue: Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE
Admission FREE
Opening times: Mon.-Wed., Fri.-Sat.: 10.00-18.00;Thurs.: 10.00-22.00; Sun.: 11.00-18.00.

James Peto, Senior Curator at Wellcome Collection comments: "Mark Clarke's work brings wit, inventiveness and no little skill to the world of the museum vitrine. His delight in the materials he finds and in the stories he uses them to convey is infectious."

Mark Clarke commented: “I’m delighted to showcase this work at Wellcome Collection and have the opportunity to tell the stories, myths and legends behind these fascinating and colourful characters. The materials have been sourced from the markets of Belfast and the skips of Paris, while decommissioned cabinets have come from the ceramics department of the Victoria & Albert Museum, porcelain tiles have been derived from the bathroom department of a local DIY superstore.”

The five cabinets will be on display in the auditorium and ground floor of Wellcome Collection.

The cabinets and the stories that they tell:

The Countess of Chinchón
When court physicians were unable to treat her malaria fever, the wife of the Spanish Viceroy of Peru (the Countess of Chinchón) turned to an alternative native remedy: cinchona bark that later, farmed in India and Africa, became known as quinine. We see her en route on elephant-back wearing golden designer trainers in a seed propagator glasshouse.

Hildegard of Bingen
Hildegard of Bingen began having religious visions at an early age and practised medicine in her role as Abbess of Rupertsberg. Her main work was on the curative powers of herbs, stones and animals. Here this 12th-century nun features as part of a felt-worked altar inside the case of an 18th-century grandfather clock.

Scurvy
The classic shipboard disease triggered by a deficiency of vitamin C. The cabinet features a Biba Nova scurvy-scarred mermaid basking on a mirrored seabed of 1930s sequinned fruit.

Mary Seacole
Mary Seacole is the Jamaican-born nurse who battled against prejudice and travelled under her own steam and at her own expense to care for the troops in the Crimean War. She was a character as exceptional and heroic as her ventures. The cabinet features Seacole toting her bag of lucky charms in her makeshift field hospital under a patchwork parasol.

Blood-letting
Through history, blood-letting has been used to treat all manner of ills including madness, syphilis, fevers and love-sickness. The cabinet features a Revolutionary merveilleuse dripping her way through an upturned Paris, trying out the treatment and putting on a ball-of-string aristo’s wig. She is dressed in a Victorian muslin collar, dragging a World War II nurse’s apron.

Notes to editors

For further details, images, interview requests or to attend the press private view please contact:

Mike Findlay
Media Officer (Wellcome Collection)
T 020 7611 8612
E m.findlay@wellcome.ac.uk

Mark Clarke
Mark Clarke was born in Belfast. He studied visual communication at Edinburgh University. Based in London, during his career he has worked in illustration, interiors and film. Last year he relocated to Bath. He now works out of Widcombe Studios where he continues to develop his 3D narratives.

Clarke’s work is a mixed marriage of cut-up cultural references - think Alexander Calder’s ‘Le Cirque’ sculptures, Guy Peellaert’s ‘Rock Dreams’, Joseph Cornell’s boxes, the Tales From Europe’s ‘Singing Ringing Tree’, Eduardo Paolozzi’s ‘Lost Magic Kingdom’ blended together in a modern 21st-century kind of way.

The Wellcome Trust is the largest charity in the UK. It funds innovative biomedical research, in the UK and internationally, spending over £600 million each year to support the brightest scientists with the best ideas. The Wellcome Trust supports public debate about biomedical research and its impact on health and wellbeing.

The Wellcome Trust's former headquarters, the Wellcome Building on London's Euston Road, has been redesigned by Hopkins Architects to become a new £30m public venue. Free to all, Wellcome Collection explores the connections between medicine, life and art in the past, present and future. The building comprises three galleries, a public events space, the Wellcome Library, a café, a bookshop, conference facilities and a members' club.