The Orpen Archive
The Collection holds a very significant body of work by artist and medical illustrator Diana "dickie" Orpen.BAPRAS possesses over 2,500 of the many technical illustrations, cartoons and pastel images she produced.
These images detail the bespoke and often novel surgical reconstructions being undertaken by the plastic surgery team, whilst also including works illustrating life and the characters she encountered in the operating theatres. Orpen recorded complex reconstructions, difficult to describe in words. Whilst photography was already in use, it had limitations. Orpen used her skills in anatomy and illustration to quickly record critical aspects of the procedures, the surgeons often stepping aside for her to sketch, before she later filled in the details. These drawings then acting as both clinical records of treatment and teaching aids for aspiring surgeons.
The Orpen works came to us from multiple sources. Most are contained within 36, 8 x 6 inch “Windsor and Newton” card-bound sketchbooks she used at Hill End Hospital, St Albans. During the period 1942 to 1945 she worked for Rainsford Mowlem, one of the “Big Four” plastic surgeons at the time in Britain. The Hill End Unit moved to Mount Vernon Hospital in 1953 where the books remained until the early 2000’s being passed to the BAPRAS archive when the plastic surgery service moved again to the Royal Free Hospital.
Upon each illustration is recorded the patient’s name, surgeon’s initials, date of the operation and its place in the sequence of procedures the individual had to endure.
Orpen produced many additional instructive illustrations for the book “Operative Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery” by Mowlem’ one time trainee, John Barron and Madgy Saad. When Barron died, the original drawings passed to Saad, who then donated them to BAPRAS.
Some of Orpen’s art is retained by her family and other pieces she donated to the surgeons whose work she illustrated. Some we know were destroyed when those surgeons passed on but there may be many more out there, somewhere.
The list of images within the Collection can be accessed through our online database.
