Kyiv’s collection of architectural gems would not be complete without two old buildings in Bohdan Khmelnytsky Street: the Anatomy Theater, built by the famous architect Beretti, and a handsome free-standing building across the street, which belonged to Vasyl Obraztsov, the outstanding therapist and professor. Unfortunately, Obraztsov’s house is now in the vicinity of a busy foreign consulate with visa applicants constantly coming and going. Meanwhile, “Beretti’s Theater” is still used for its original purpose, serving science and education, albeit in a somewhat different capacity: for nearly a quarter of a century it has housed Ukraine’s National Museum of Medicine.
The annals of, arguably, the finest institution for the study of anatomy in 19th-century Europe could fill an entire novel. For example, Volodymyr Bets, who was the first to discover “intelligence cells” in the architectonics of the brain, worked here. These walls remember such students as Mikhail Bulgakov and Valentyn Voino-Yasenetsky, the future Archbishop Luka. The museum is no less intriguing. Its creator and organizer, State Prize of Ukraine laureate Professor Oleksandr Grando, applied absolutely unusual techniques to create a panorama of the museum’s expositions. Representing the gamut of Ukrainian medicine in the form of rare books, documents, photographs, and tools, the museum’s organizers also made use of theater techniques to convey their original vision of history. For example, the artist Spartak Brytan created life-size, portrait-like scenes from Kyiv’s medical past. Mykola Pyrohov and Volodymyr Karavayev are shown standing over an operating table, Danylo Zabolotny is peering into a microscope, and Vasyl Obraztsov is examining a patient. The masterful execution of these interiors could compete with the Madame Tussaud waxworks. Combined with the fantastic changeability of the expositions operated by special equipment, these showrooms make a dazzling and romantic impression on visitors. It is no accident that the museum’s collection is considered one of the world’s finest. “I don’t know who will come after me,” Grando wrote in his book Nebahato pro mynule [A Little about the Past]. “He will obviously have other kinds of impulses concerning the development of what I started, but I would like this undertaking to be continued in a worthy manner.”
Recently Vadym Shypulin, who has a Ph.D. in Medicine, was appointed to direct the museum. Despite his rather young age, he is known throughout Kyiv as a popular and gifted gastroenterologist. After 15 years of training and research in internal medicine, Assistant Professor Shypulin is practicing and teaching his favorite subject at Oleksandr Bohomolets National Medical University. Why has Dr. Shypulin suddenly taken a detour from his main walk of life?
“Of course, I will not abandon my main profession and, if you like, my calling,” says Shypulin. “But I am a native Kyivan and an interest in the history of my city is in my blood. A few years ago my teacher, Professor Vyacheslav Hryhorovych Perederiy, who chairs our 150-year-old department, and I wrote a book entitled Spravzhni likari [Real Doctors]. In essence, this book is a gallery of our predecessors at the famous clinic on 17 Shevchenko Boulevard: Friedrich Mering, Vasyl Obraztsov, Feofil Yanovsky, and other luminaries of Ukrainian medicine. The book is based on archival finds, research into the development of medical thought, and studies of old publications. This book, which captivated me, became a prologue of sorts to my new position, a laboratory of other thoughts and other goals.”
“I have first-hand knowledge of this museum, as I participated in its creation and proposed ideas for individual interiors, such as the lifelike scene called ‘County doctor in a peasant hut,’ whose protagonist resembles Chekhov. Incidentally, this scene was reproduced in Leonid Parfionov’s televised series about Aleksandr III. But I also encounter blank spots in the museum, primarily the cellar, which Bulgakov depicted in his White Guard. Do you, as a commentator on the past, plan to reenter these mysterious places?”
“You know, there are such plans. This very cellar, which for a long time served as a morgue, saw the beginning or, to be more precise, the continuation of a bloody story known internationally as the ‘Beilis trial.’ This was the place where coroners delivered the corpse of the unfortunate boy, Andriy Yushchynsky, who had multiple stab wounds, which resulted in charges of ‘a ritual killing’ against Mendel Beilis. Kyiv jurors should be given their due, as they saw through this provocation by ultra-reactionaries and acquitted the defendant. It is symbolic that a major role in this contest between slander and justice was played by the Reverend Oleksandr Hlaholyev (Oleksandr’s father in The White Guard), who proved the absolute groundlessness of the prosecution’s speculations. However, it was not the judges but the jurors — ordinary Ukrainian peasants — who believed Beilis and returned the verdict of ‘not guilty.’ I believe that in our time it is highly relevant to publicize the result of this trial, in which truth triumphed over lies, and xenophobia got no support from the public, even if we do so in an absolutely unexpected way.”
“It sounds like your project has merit even though it has more to do with forensic science than medicine.”
“Other situations involving various personalities — from the recreation in the museum’s dioramas of the details of medical assistance during the unforgettable battles of the Zaporozhian Sich Cossacks to acts of heroism by medical assistants and doctors during the defense of Kyiv in the Holosiyiv area in the grim summer of 1941 — also represent feats of ‘paramedicine.’ But you must agree that such stories are exciting even from a purely historical viewpoint. As far as past conflicts are concerned, I have an idea to show the circumstances of Russian Prime Minister Petr Stolypin’s death in Kyiv in 1911 after he was shot in the opera house.”
“What’s the secret here?”
“The tragedy was played out within half a kilometer of this building. It would have been more logical to deliver the wounded prime minister to the clinic at 17 Bibikov Boulevard, now Shevchenko Boulevard, one block from the opera house, rather than to Dr. Makovsky’s private clinic in Malo- Volodymyrska Street (later renamed Stolypin Street, Chkalov Street, and now Honchar Street). Of course, Makovsky consulted the luminaries of Ukrainian medicine, in particular Mykola Volkovych and Vasyl Obraztsov. Nonetheless, it has not been ruled out that precious time was lost for possible life-saving surgery. In actual fact, the fatal outcome was caused not by Bogrov’s shot but by splinters of his medal that was shattered by the bullet.”
“The most important exhibit in the museum is the chronicle of medical science, which must be interpreted objectively. Will it require updating and revising?”
“To be frank, the role of Ukrainian medical schools in the evolution of global science is represented in a very one-sided and local manner, although entirely in the spirit of the past. At the apex of the scientific exhibits are the achievements of the schools of Oleksandr Bohomolets, Oleksandr Palladin, Volodymyr Filatov, Mykola Strazhesko, and other official “saints” of medicine, who appear to be eternal fixtures of progress in Ukraine’s medical science in the 20th century. In reality, medical thought was actively developing in other directions through a broad range of personalities and schools of medical science. All these facts are represented in a synthesizing spiral of medicine throughout the one thousand years of its development in the book Vydatni imena u svitoviy medytsyni [Outstanding Names in World Medicine], which was published in 2000 under the museum’s auspices and under the editorship of Oleksandr Grando. At least part of this information should be represented in the museum’s showrooms, for example, the achievements and personality of Zelman Waksman, a native of Ukraine, who won the Nobel Prize for his discovery of streptomycin, or Yevhen Zavoisky, who was the first to discover the phenomenon of magnetic resonance and was also forced to leave his native land.
“How can we not display the cohort of brilliant Ukrainian scientists who were executed or tortured to death by the NKVD? Among them were Oleksandr Puchkovsky, Volodymyr Pidhayetsky, Volodymyr Udovenko, Oleksandr Cherniakhovsky, and others. How can we not recount the story of Valentyna Radzymovska, who organized physiology and biochemistry departments and divisions in several institutes? She spent seven months in a solitary confinement cell during the trial of the members of the SVU (Union for the Liberation of Ukraine), but did not admit to any of the false accusations. In 1933 Andriy Zhuravel, assistant professor at the Kharkiv Institute for Doctors’ Upgrading, was the first to publicly announce at a meeting of the People’s Commissariat of Health that famine was raging and intensifying in Ukraine. This was something that everybody knew, but nevertheless a stance of hypocritical silence. Zhuravel was soon arrested and executed in a Solovky camp in 1938. So far his photograph appears only in a new book by Oleksandr Holiachenko and Yaroslav Hanitkevych, Istoriia medytsyny [History of Medicine], and is not represented in any of the museum’s exhibits.”
“You are absolutely right. Still, the museum is, so to speak, a train carriage from the past to the future with a limited number of seats.”
“So allow me to make a generalizing conclusion in an attempt to fairly distribute seats on such a ‘train carriage.’ In my view, the thesis that we are choosing European vectors should materialize in the museum in a modern representation of the achievements of world medicine whose face is changing rapidly. In this sense this miraculous palace should become a tuning fork of progress and not just a stone tablet of the past.”
“How do you picture the future of this ‘theater of history’?”
“I hope and believe that it will soon reclaim the status of one of the most visited museums in the capital. In fact, this was so for many years. However, new times require new approaches, ideas, solutions, and accomplishments in this sensitive sphere. On the other hand, this is primarily a scientific museum, and the expositions mostly attract sightseeing crowds not in the least because the most interesting route along this circle of history features specialized, absolutely unique technical installations and innovative automatic devices that switch on in sequence. As far as I know, this has great appeal for the general public, especially young people. However, it is impossible to conduct more than six or seven tours a day, which is why the museum will preserve the characteristics of elitism and secrecy, so to speak. Well, this is how it should be.”
“The museum invariably attracts a flood of medical people of all specialties and ranks. One would think that this flood will continue, as Kyiv is quickly turning into one of the capitals of world science. Therefore, the museum must also have a unique appearance in this respect, don’t you think?”
“I am certain that this is one of our weak spots. Modernizing technologies, without which we will not advance, will enable us quickly to modify and diversify the scientific exhibits, pegging them to epoch- making dates in medical science, major events, and noteworthy intellectual milestones on the global scale, in combination with conferences, meetings, and workshops on the museum’s premises, since there is every opportunity to do so now.”
