Science on Display: Cultural Experiments in Early Modern Science

This is Ellen Wurtzel, associate professor of History at Oberlin College and specialist in medieval and early modern Europe. Realizing we had a fabulous collection of materials about scientific and medical knowledge in the period between 1500 and 1800, I proposed creating an exhibit in conjunction with my course, Of Miracles and Microscopes. With Hannah Kinney, former curator of academic programs, and Marlise Brown, associate curator of European and American art, we assembled 10 to 12 works that spoke to some of the topics we study in the course, including medical practice, humoral bodies, and the role that plants were thought to hold vis a vis human health. I was particularly inspired by The Botanist, the portrait that has pride of place in our exhibit—a well-dressed man of the early 1600s holding a plant and a book, with dirt under his fingernails. The visible links between hands-on experience, print knowledge, and professional status provides an intriguing glimpse into how the study and use of the natural world was changing in this period, and how those changes were driven by new groups of people jockeying for power. I hoped that by putting together this exhibit, we would not only highlight some of the amazing developments of the scientific revolution, we would also learn new information about these little-studied artefacts. As you will see, students did a superlative job of both.

Everything you see and hear in this exhibit was designed by the 31 students who were part of Miracles and Microscopes in the Spring of 2024 with the help of our teaching assistant, Elsa Friedmann. They visited the museum and special collections, chose the specific works to include in the exhibit, and researched them extensively. One group met with Oberlin botanist and professor of Biology Mike Moore, in a successful effort to identify the plant that the botanist is holding in the portrait. With guidance from the museum staff and plenty of peer review, they wrote each of the labels, created and recorded the audio guides, and collaborated on the catalog essays. We learned an enormous amount about this period’s changing landscape through these individual pieces, as well as the process of mounting an exhibit. We think you will find it as fascinating as we did. Thank you.