As a high school student interested in both art and science, Leonie Schön found her muse in an unlikely place. While doing an internship in a medical laboratory, Schön, now a pathologist at Evangelical Hospital Oberhausen, was mesmerized by blood cells that she saw under the microscope. “I was just so excited about all those colors because…I [had] never seen something like this before,” recalled Schön. “I really loved the idea of painting that someday.”
Leonie Schön, a pathologist, draws inspiration from what she sees under the microscope, and turns it into vivid paintings.
Leonie Schön
However, this vision took a backseat as she chased her medical degree, even though every pathology class served as a reminder of that dream waiting to happen. During the pandemic, with some time on her hands, Schön finally dove into the project.
Through her paintings, Schön brings the hidden microscopic world to life on the canvas. Her venture, called Lamellipodium Art, explores the connection between art and medicine, highlighting the intricate details of cells as seen through a pathologist’s eyes. In addition to selling her artwork in the form of postcards, prints, and scrunchies, Schön also shares her paintings on social media platforms like Instagram, where she has more than 85,000 followers.
The idea to call her artwork platform “Lamellipodium” materialized during her medical training. As part of a project, Schön and her team examined cytoskeletal structures of drug-treated cancer cells to investigate the cells’ motility. Schön became familiar with lamellipodia, protrusions at the front of migrating cells that act as the cells’ motor. “I was really transfixed by these little structures,” she said. “They look just…so pretty.”
One of Schön’s series consists of six watercolor paintings illustrating different special stains on different tissues and diseases used in laboratories.
Leonie Schön
Schön’s artistic process looks different depending on the final outcome. While she prefers watercolors for smaller paintings to capture the slight transparency of tissues under the microscope, she turns to oil paints or acrylics for her larger work to convey intricate details concretely.
Most of Schön’s paintings are part of a series. One of her painting collections showcases common cancers, while another one demonstrates different hematological diseases. According to Schön, this is not an attempt to find beauty in disease; rather she wants to offer a different perspective on the condition through a pathologist’s lens.
Her artwork captures not only the world beneath the microscope but also the techniques pathologists use to peek into it. Some of her paintings show how tissues look when stained with different dyes. While she has displayed her paintings in local exhibitions, she found stronger community support online.
Schön has also painted a series about the Tumor Node Metastasis (TNM) system used worldwide to standardize tumor reporting to guide treatment and research.
Leonie Schön
Some social media challenges prompted Schön to share her artwork on Instagram, where a couple of her reels went viral, attracting a huge following. “It's really nice to have this network all around the world,” said Schön. “It’s really interesting because you get to talk about pathology and histology and see how different countries approach things differently.”
However, Schön does not consider her work as science communication. While she ensures that her drawings are scientifically accurate, “it’s a different job to do medical illustration. It’s not something I’m trained for,” she said, adding that she does not think of educational value when she puts brush to canvas. “It's more about showing off what the body can do,” said Schön.
