SERIES
Walk Back to Your Body: Dr. Timothy Schacker
Dancers of all ages who wear hospital gowns with plastic gloves attatched are watched by a seated audience in the Target Studio Gallery at the Weisman.
Lifelong Choreographies performance, created by artist Anna Marie Shogren and Nursing School professor Kristine Talley at the Center for Aging Science and Care Innovation.

Last fall, four artists and five medical researchers embarked on interdisciplinary collaborations that, like Shogren and Talley's project, Lifelong Choreographies (pictured above), have led to new cultural perspectives on complex medical questions. This series of blog posts is meant to highlight their processed before the culmination of these collaborations, taking place in the Target Studio on December 5. More info about that event here >>

Vice Dean for Research at the UMN Medical School Dr. Timothy Schacker established himself as a crucial advocate for Target Studio’s art and health collaborations from the very beginning. Emphasizing the importance of injecting new ways of thinking into the medical community, Dr. Schacker explained that collaboration is in the very nature of a university.

“What’s unusual about this is we’re really taking two divergent ways of doing things and mixing those up,” Dr. Schacker said. “This is really a way to get new collaborations and new ways of thinking.”

Seldom a straight line from point A to point B, Dr. Schacker sees the way that artists work as a beneficial example for the scientific community. In collaboration with medical researchers, artists have an opportunity to see and influence how medical knowledge is constructed and communicated, and alter researchers interpretation skills—all of which ultimately influence the processes of both the artist and the researcher. Dr. Schacker hopes this project will inform and becomes an essential part of the medical school culture.

“The lesson learned so far is that we can do this. We can find collaborations and partnerships that are meaningful and productive, that add value and benefit both the medical school faculty and the artists,” Dr. Schacker said. “We won’t see what will ultimately come of this [Walk Back to Your Body], but so far, the milestones and what we have learned is that this can work, and it will be a great benefit.”

Join Dr. Timothy Schacker, artists and researchers, Dean of Medical School Dr. Jakub Tolar, and Target Studio Curator for Creative Collaboration Boris Oicherman in conversation on December 5.

Let us know you’re coming>>