Ciara McMahon is an ACW alumni, and also a medical doctor and a practicing artist. She has just written an opinion piece for artsandhealth.ie, entitled Shall we discuss this outside? A look at artistic and medical responses to ethical quandaries, in which she discusses how the fields of art and medicine differ in their responses to ethical issues. In it she argues that contemporary art practice provides an opportunity to engage ethical issues that are of direct relevance to medicine, and furthermore provide an opportunity to do this in a way that may not be possible or acceptable within medical discourse itself. She cites examples of recent work by Artur Zmijewski and Sophie Calle that raise difficult ethical questions and suggests that the debates surrounding art such as this constitute useful ways of trying to answer questions raised within medical ethics.
The full article is available to read on the artsandhealth.ie site here. Please feel free to leave any responses to, or comments on, Ciara’s article below. It would be interesting to hear what people think about it.