COURTESY OF VANESSA RUIZMost people learn the basics of human anatomy as children. Asked who taught them this information, many would acknowledge their parents, science teachers, and physicians. But what anyone who has ever flipped through a biology textbook or gazed at an anatomy diagram in a doctor’s office might not realize is that there’s another group that deserves credit for helping them see beneath their own skin: medical illustrators.
“It’s funny,” said medical illustrator Vanessa Ruiz. “Doctors and scientists tend to take [medical illustration] for granted. Many don’t realize that there are people who draw the body parts we see everywhere in medical literature.”
Ruiz, 30, is the driving force behind Street Anatomy, a blog that aggregates works that explore the intersection of art and medical illustration. Since its 2007 launch, Street Anatomy has published more than 1,000 posts, revealing human anatomy in pencil drawings, tattoos, 3-D printing, and interior design, among other media.
Fascinated by the surge in street art that was happening in Chicago, where at the time she was pursuing a master’s degree in biomedical visualization at the University of Illinois, Ruiz created Street Anatomy in the hopes of taking medical ...
