Poster Power: Picturing Health and Medicine in the 20th Century (360G-Wellcome-203596_Z_16_Z)

This project would contribute to the history of medicine galleries at the Science Museum and has the potential to form part of the new Medicine Galleries, launching in 2019. It investigates the material and visual culture of the public health poster as both object and vehicle of knowledge. It examines the role of visual imagery within health education accounting for images as important forms of communication central to understanding the historical development of disease risk in the twentieth century. From vaccination, diet and dentistry to smoking, hygiene and AIDS, health education has been shaped by its visualisations. This project traces the rise of the public health poster in the 20th Century and links this to wider developments in medical equipment, intervention and the place of the public. It seeks to engage non-academic audiences with the history of medicine by examining how health concerns have been visualised and presented to the public historically. Through the inclusion of a public events element, this project will show how these posters can be used as tools of engagement to examine the intertwining of the visual and the medical throughout the twentieth century. Keywords: poster, public health, health education, visual culture