The Fulbright Experience



"The brain is a world consisting of a number of unexplored continents and great stretches of unknown territory."

― Santiago Ramón y Cajal



All of the drawings in my Cajal portfolio are created straightforwardly with markers and pen. I do not use a pencil sketch to commence each work. Therefore, I do not begin the drawings from the process of erasing and correcting the formative layer. Each illustration is created through the building up of an additive process and no erasing. Why would I do this?



It is about the form and content of the project. I will explain. In 2017 I was fortunate to be awarded the Fulbright España Senior Research Fellowship to the Instituto Cajal, Madrid, Spain. By the time I received my award, I had already recreated through observing and drawing the primary source, over 14 of Cajal's scientific drawings that had been on display at the NIH. I had begun to develop theories about the construction of some of his drawings: He did not use a pencil to create some of his scientific illustrations but instead just drew them directly with ink.


Why do I think he did this?

1) Pragmatic: It is a more efficient way of working because he would only have to draw a work once - opposed to retracing it with ink.

2) Philosophic: In some cases, it is a more accurate, truthfully descriptive way of expressing the realism of a neuron's contour.


When I arrived at the Instituto Cajal, I wanted to look at his sketchbook and original, rarely studied journals. Behaviorally, how his drawings are constructed in his sketchbook would reveal a great deal about his disposition toward drawing. If there were a lot of erasing and redrawing of forms or if the images were drawn confidently one time without erasing them, it would reveal a lot about his attitude toward and behavior while drawing. I found the latter to be true. He used a wide variety of materials in his sketchbook. He used pencil primarily (based on the line quality, I suspect a 2B or darker lead value) in his sketchbook, so he was always prepared to erase. But I found that he did not do this upon examining the entire sketchbook. Absent were the residue, smudges, and other scars that occur to the paper's surface when one erases lead or graphite. The most common imperfections I observed in the sketchbook was torn out missing pages, food and water stains, or spills and ink splatters.


Because I can recreate his work through drawing with accuracy in one sitting without using a pencil or eraser, I believe he drew some of his work outright like that, too.


― Dawn Hunter, March 2021



Dawn Hunter



Re-creation of inside back cover of Cajal's first sketchbook from Valencia, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14", 2017.



Santiago Ramón y Cajal, top Dawn Hunter, bottom.



Re-creation of inside back cover of Cajal's first sketchbook from Valencia, Fulbright Espana, Instiuto Cajal, Madrid, Spain. Photo by Dawn Hunter.



Santiago Ramón y Cajal



Cajal's first sketchbook from Valencia, opened to pages with an insert and ink spatters and pastel smudges. Photo by Dawn Hunter.



Dawn Hunter



Re-creation of pages from Cajal's first sketchbook from Valencia, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14", 2017.



The experience of drawing Cajal's sketchbook pages was vital to me. I had looked at the sketchbook for several days by the time I drew this drawing. It wasn't until I drew this drawing that I noticed the Easter Egg - the smiling face in the cell at the top of the left page under the word "fresc."



Dawn Hunter



Study of Cajal's scientific drawing Células Pequeñas de Axon Horizontal, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14", 2017.



Above is one of the drawings I drew while at the Instituto Cajal in Madrid that does not have any preliminary pencil lines before inking it. The drawing does have water stains. I recreated the entire situation in this drawing - the light filtering into the space and the protective frame I placed over the work. I added Cajal's signature (from a different piece) to my drawing to create visual balance and an aesthetic juxtaposition.



Dawn Hunter



Re-creation of Cajal's first sketchbook from Valencia opened to the pages in which he drew neurons for the first time. Marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14", 2017.



Overall, Cajal draws very confidently throughout his sketchbook. His line quality demonstrated doubt when he drew neurons for the first time. I theorize that the neurons' lines did not meet where he expected them to meet or connect. I believe Cajal knew from this first sketchbook drawing that the nervous system was not a mesh network.



Santiago Ramón y Cajal



Células Pequeñas de Axon Horizontal. Documentary photo by Dawn Hunter.



Above is one of Cajal's drawings housed at the Instituto Cajal in Madrid. This drawing does not have any preliminary pencil lines drawn on the paper before he inked it. The drawing does have water stains, and he has used white ink to eliminate lines that he does not want in the final work.



Santiago Ramón y Cajal



Drawing of Pyramidal Neurons of a Duck. Documentary photo by Dawn Hunter.



Above is Cajal's drawing of the Pyramidal neurons of a duck. Featured are the front and the back of the drawing. Cajal used a pencil to sketch out this drawing before inking it. On the back of the drawing, the underlined writing is not Cajal's handwriting. Cajal's handwriting is in the middle, and the words indicate the size in which the drawing is to be printed: 1/2 (una mitad.)



Dawn Hunter, above. Santiago Ramón y Cajal, below.



Células Pequeñas de Axon Horizontal, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14", 2017. Documentary photo by Dawn Hunter.



Above is a photo that shows the process of how I replicated this particular drawing. I did not draw guidelines from the ruler however, I placed the ruler on the page so that the ruler's horizontal edge could help guide me as I illustrated horizontal neurons' anatomy. The ruler also helped as a reference for proportion. The blue-green dots indicate where I thought the cells would be located on the drawing however, I realized that I placed them too high. I, therefore, lowered them. This photo shows the scale of my work in comparison to Cajal's original drawing. I re-create his work 125%-200% bigger than it is in real life.


Dawn Hunter



Study of Cajal's scientific Pyramidal Neuron Drawing, (front) and back, ink, marker and pen on paper, 2017.



This drawing is a re-creation of Cajal's drawing of the Pyramidal neurons of a duck. It was essential for me to see and re-create because it was the first drawing of Cajal's, which I viewed on the web that captured my imagination. Cajal did sketch out this drawing in pencil first. I did not use a pencil to re-create it, and I do not use pencils or graphite in my illustrations for this series. Therefore when I replicate graphite, I use fine tip pens in the color yellow-green. Yellow-green is used to signify Cajal's pencil lines in my series.



The Fulbright Experience, other opportunities to explore the original source:



Aside from researching Cajal's sketchbook, I also drew and examined objects from his life. These items include rare items like the original mold for his death mask, his research chair, photos he printed, or photos printed from the negatives of images he took and other personal items housed in Legado Cajal.



Dawn Hunter



Drawing Cajal's death mask, Instituto Cajal, Madrid, Spain. Documentary photo by Dawn Hunter.



Dawn Hunter



Drawing of Cajal's Death Mask, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14," 2017.



Dawn Hunter



Colorizing Cajal's 19th Century World, Two Silverias, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14," 2018.



Cajal took the photos of Silveria that are featured in this drawing. He did not, however, print them in juxtaposition. Whoever printed them would have done so until approximately 15 years after his death. The paper that the photos are printed on was first produced in the mid-1940s. Despite that, I found the juxtaposition interesting and used the printed black and white images as a reference to create this work in color.



Dawn Hunter



Drawing of Cajal's Research Chair, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14," 2017.



Above is a drawing of Cajal's research chair, and the chair has the image of a dragon embossed on the leather. Metaphorically I found this interesting because of the imagery he described filling his childhood drawings - some of which were dragons.



Dawn Hunter



Legado Cajal, marker and pen on paper, 11" x 14," 2017.



My daughter, walking in Madrid after dinner, dressed as the dragon from Cajal's research chair. Personal photo by Dawn Hunter.



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