Iris Fegerl – The Lady Anatomist (Documentary film)

The Lady Anatomist, 2018
Documentary film
55 Min
Sponsored by maecenia Foundation for Women in Science and the Arts

Courtesy Iris Fegerl

Iris Fegerl’s film powerfully tells the story of Anna Morandi Manzolini, the first woman to gain admission to the exclusively male domain of the university in the 18th century. She was the first woman to be employed as a preparator and to teach anatomy to male students at a time when such a role for a woman was unthinkable. The film offers insights into society and the intellectual climate of the Enlightenment, as well as the University of Bologna’s academic environment.

In Europe, Bologna was regarded as the centre of anatomical science. However, only men were allowed to teach and study in its anatomical theatre; women were present solely as cadavers laid bare on the dissecting table, their bodies cut open and reduced to parts by the presiding anatomist.

Anna Morandi Manzolini became the first woman to overturn this prescribed role. She dissected hundreds of bodies and translated the knowledge she gained into meticulously crafted scientific models. These works presented the human body in a new way, distinct from the traditional, pathos-laden depictions of her time.

And yet, over the centuries Morandi Manzolini fell into obscurity—not least because her works were attributed to others and she was dismissed as illiterate. She was the first female scientist to focus, through her plastic representations, on the relationship between physical constitution and sensory perception—laying a foundation for what would later become the neurosciences.