"There is a beautiful
expression to faces captured in bronze," says Halifax
neurosurgeon and sculptor Dr Ivar Mendez, here with
the clay model for a bust he did of his mentor Dr
Charles Drake. |
The likeness is rendered using
the earth's most basic material: clay. Once the form
is set, a rubber cast is taken. This "negative" mould
will be used to create the wax "positive," which is
then dipped in slurry several times until a hard ceramic
shell is formed. At the foundry molten bronze is poured
through a hole in the shell, melting the wax positive
inside. When it cools the ceramic casing is chipped
away to reveal the bronze cast. Finally, a carefully
chosen patina is applied to the metal, giving it its
distinctive finish.
The method, called "lost wax",
has been practised in neurosurgeon and sculptor Dr Ivar
Mendez's birthplace, Bolivia, since the days of the
great Incan Empire. The complexity of this ancient art
shows it's no amateur pursuit. Dr Mendez approaches
nothing with amateurism.
When the University of Western
Ontario (UWO) asked him to create a bust of his mentor,
famed neurosurgeon Dr Charles Drake, Dr Mendez proudly
accepted the commission. "It was an honour for me to
do the sculpture," he says. "He was a wonderful person
devoted to his patients." During his PhD, Dr Mendez
trained under Dr Drake who is perhaps best known for
developing a novel tool (called the Drake clip) to treat
brain aneurysm. He says he chose to depict his hero
in bronze because it's the perfect medium for a man
with Dr Drake's technical ability and humility. The
bust was unveiled in 2003 and stands in front of London
Health Sciences Centre.
Dr Mendez's bust of Dr
Charles Drake. The inset shows a detail of a brain
aneurysm held by a "Drake clip" |
REVOLUTIONARY
ROOTS
The thoughtful, proud, quietly passionate Dr Mendez
was born in Bolivia's capital, La Paz. His lush but
poor homeland is high up in the Andes and has a population
that is about 60% indigenous. Bolivia, named for Simon
Bolivar, the revolutionary who helped the country win
independence from the Spanish in 1825, has always been
politically turbulent.
"When I was 12, Dad decided there
was a lot of instability in Bolivia," Dr Mendez recalls.
"It was hard for my parents to move but easy for us
kids." Though he's lived in Canada most of his life,
Dr Mendez's art has always drawn on images of the Andean
people — "I'm inspired by their struggle, their
dignity, their strength and their fragility," he says.
He started sculpting when he was a teenager and says
it was tough to choose his vocation when he finished
high school. The fact that his father was a neurologist
helped a bit. "I thought how interesting it was that
an organic structure such as the brain could produce
thought," he reflects. "It started from curiosity and
imagination — that's when I decided."
PATH
TO GREATNESS
In those early days, it's unlikely the young Ivar Mendez
knew where the creative turn of his mind would take
him. Among the many milestones littering his path are
innovations in neural transplantation, including demonstrating
for the first time that a transplanted cell could actually
make a synaptic connection with another cell in the
host brain. He's since developed a system for performing
the transplantations. He and his team also performed
the first remote robotic tele-mentoring neurosurgery
in the world between Halifax and Saint John, NB, 400
km apart. As if that wasn't enough, he's also a leading
expert in deep brain stimulation, which he uses to reduce
tremors in patients with severe neurological disorders.
His latest pet project is the Brain
Repair Centre in Halifax, the jewel in the crown of
Dalhousie's medical faculty. In a funding announcement
for the Centre, NS Premier John Hamm trumpeted: "Halifax
has Canada's only neural transplant program. It is one
of only four in the world."
Dr Mendez's own team is also awestruck
by its leader's talents and altruism. "He raises the
bar for everyone in the workplace," says Paula Gaudet,
program coordinator in the Division of Neurosurgery
at the QEII. "We see the sacrifices that he makes and
so we want to help. We feel we're part of something
great."
HELP
FOR HOME
He goes back to Bolivia at least once a year. He's been
generous with his knowledge and his time to help the
people there. Setting up dental clinics in rural areas
and a breakfast program for kids, feeding 500 every
day. Dr Mendez genuinely doesn't get why people are
so admiring of charity work. "It's the logical extension
of realizing inequalities exist in the world," he says.
At home in Nova Scotia, to get
away from it all, Dr Mendez and his wife Kerrie, an
occupational therapist, go to their cottage by the sea.
His son Adrian has decided to follow in his father and
grandfather's footsteps and be a doctor. "I never influenced
him," says Dr Mendez. "I always thought he'd be a writer."
Dr Mendez insists art is not a
way of relaxing from his job — art is as much a
part of his life as surgery. "I accommodate my work
schedule to the art so they don't conflict. "
Unsurprisingly, this keen-eyed
doctor is also a talented photographer and is currently
working on a book of photos of the Andes he plans to
sell to raise money for his projects in Bolivia. But
his latest artistic inspirations come from a little
closer to home: icebergs. He loves their "force, size
and aluminium quality — and the fact they're very
Canadian." He adds, "They may seem inanimate, but they
have great grace and dynamism. Looking at them gives
you a sense of peace." Funny, they sound something like
a Bolivian we know.
Additional reporting by Lisa
Rutherford
|
