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EW SHOW DAILY 54 Drawing on success began attending retreats taught by master artists. "I did a series of those, and I had a lot of wonderful teachers who were quite advanced because those courses mostly attract very good amateurs or professional artists," he said. Ironically, an artistic turning point came in 1987 when Dr. Rootman entered a contest to have a painting of his appear on the cover of the Canadian Medical Association Journal. "One of my pieces was chosen," he said. "A gallerist saw that piece and invited me to consider doing a show." From there he joined the Canadian Federation of Artists, com- posed of a mixture of professionals and amateurs in the field. "For many years I showed in their exhibitions and over time had a number of group shows and some individual exhibitions," Dr. Rootman said. He also started to take night courses at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design. By 1995 Dr. Rootman took a one-year leave of absence from his department chairmanship and went to New York City to develop his skill further. He was not, however, interested in earning an art-related degree. "I wanted to study with a particular artist, so I studied at the Sunday, April 27, 2014 Dr. Rootman explores life's full palette I t is well known to all of his patients. Ophthalmologist Jack Rootman, MD, professor of ophthalmology and pathology, University of British Columbia, and visiting professor, University of California, Los Angeles, has another passion—art. His paintings hang on his office walls, and on occasion he is known to send his patients invitations to his exhibitions. "I was interested in art even as a child," Dr. Rootman said. "But I grew up in a large immigrant family so there wasn't much opportunity to do art when I was younger." The natural direction appeared to be to choose a profession. He found he was also drawn to medicine and chose this very early in life. The budding ophthalmologist used his artistic skills to help master medical material. "I found that I drew well and instead of having to write notes I could sketch everything in anatomy and histology," he said. In the early 1980s when Dr. Rootman wrote his first book on the diseases of the orbit, he also brought his artistic talents to bear. "I got involved with medical illustrators, one of whom has become a lifelong friend, with whom I've published four out of five of my surgical and nonsurgical books," Dr. Rootman said. "My involvement was helping in the conceptual design of the images and using my art to interpret ideas for surgery for him." Artistic turn It wasn't until he was sidelined by a back injury at age 40, however, that Dr. Rootman had the opportunity to really explore his artistic side. While bedridden his wife suggested he make good use of the time. "I had fiddled a bit with art, and my wife got me some paints and said, 'Why don't you paint while you're recov- ering from this injury?'" he recalled, adding, "I really got hooked on it." Primarily he explored drawing and using watercolors for the first year or so on his own. Then he IN OTHER NEWS by Maxine Lipner EyeWorld Senior Contributing Writer Coke on the Rocks, a watercolor painting Ecstasy, Compassion, Reverie and Escape, an oil painting

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