I'm going to do something different this week and show you a book that I recently discovered because it's way too interesting to not share. It's called Pictorial Manual of Neurological Tests, written by Maurice W. Van Allen, B.A., M.D. It features some amazing illustrations by George Buckley. My edition was published in 1969. In college I minored in Psychology out of pure interest in the subject, and would've double majored if my physiological psych course wasn't so damn hard. Anyway, let's look at the cover first.
First of all, I love the dimensions of the book. It's roughly 9in by 6in, and you just don't see horizontal books that deal with such heavy material. The design is extremely simple (in a great way), and there are illustrations right on the cover, which give the piece movement. It may be 40 years old, but it somehow evokes a very modern sense of irony. Also, you can't tell from my scan but it's a cloth cover, and the blue letters almost have a letterpress effect. Now let's look inside.
Look at George's illustrations, they cut straight to the point without being static or boring. So much medical illustration lacks personality, but look at these! There's so much confidence in his line that he's making me jealous. His facial expressions are something to behold too.
Those three faces feel so modern to me, and also slightly disturbing. Even the infant illustrations somehow 'go past' the subject matter and become something else. Here are two more pages which I like, if anything for the quality of the work.
I love how that laying body has real weight to it. Also, hands are incredibly hard to draw (trust me!), but George does it with great style with and consistency.
Overall, this book was a real find and this was just the tip of the iceberg because it's full of great pages. It's cliche but they just don't make'em like this anymore. I mean, when was the last time a medical textbook made you want to look inside? Was there even a last time? In any case, awesome stuff.
So for next time I haven't decided whether I should show you another great book find, or an illustration. I have a couple illustration gigs in the pipeline so I'll figure it out.
Until next time Blog.
