History of the Murals
Ever since the Polish-born artist Bernard Zakheim painted a series of murals at UCSF in 1930s they remain the jewel of the University’s Art Collection. These murals include ten panel series in Toland Hall, “History of Medicine in California,” and two panels originally located in the Cole Hall and later moved to the Health Sciences West (HSW) lecture halls – “Modern Medicine” and “Ancient Medicine: Superstition in Medicine.”
Zakheim worked with Diego Rivera in Mexico City and is best known for contributing the Library Periodical Room fresco and helping organize the New Deal art project at the Coit Tower in San Francisco. From the time of their unveiling, the archives has been compiling reference materials about these murals and now we are delighted to report that a comprehensive set of materials documenting how these frescoes were created and preserved was donated to UCSF (Bernard Zakheim collection, MSS 2014-15).
The commission
The idea to commission murals was brought by Dr. Isabella Perry, professor of pathology after seeing the frescoes Zakheim painted at the Alemany Public Health Center and then spearheaded by Chauncey D. Leake, professor of pharmacology and medical historian. The university murals undertaking which was partially funded by the WPA Federal Art Project and also sponsored by the university was a true collaborative effort between Zakheim’s team and UCSF faculty (including renowned UCSF doctors, Chauncey D. Leake, George Lyman, Langley Porter, Salvatore P. Lucia, W. E. Carter, and F. W Lynch).
The artist was provided unrestricted access to the Crummer Room containing numerous books on the history of medicine, including recently published “California’s Medical Story” by Dr. Henry Harris. Zakheim’s assistant, Phyllis Wrightson did extensive research about California medical history which becomes apparent in the sketchbook that she kept for the project.
One of the sketches portrays fur trader James Ohio Pattie who was captured for illegal trapping in California and earned his release from Mexican imprisonment in San Diego by using the smallpox vaccine to curtail the epidemic spreading among Californians (that story based on the Pattie’s “Personal Narrative” was later proved to be inaccurate as it was measles epidemic* that occurred in Alta California at that time).
Bernard Zakheim and his team interviewed numerous faculty members who are depicted in the panel “Rational Medicine,” including Robert Stone, professor of radiology, Francis S. Smith, pediatrician and dean of the School of Medicine, Karl F. Meyer, director of the Hooper Foundation, anesthesiologist Arthur Guedel and Isabella Perry to name just a few.
