A black and white silver gelatin photograph entitled 'Leucotomy Operation 1946' by Kurt Hutton 1946. From an unknown Impressions Gallery exhibition.

The photograph shows a mental health patient undergoing a leucotomy operation, also known as a lobotomy.

Britain’s first leucotomy was performed at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, on 19 February 1941. The operation was organised by the psychiatrist Effie Lilian Hutton, who published the results of the first eight patients to be given the procedure in the Lancet, in July 1941. Despite her initial enthusiasm for such treatments, further research on their negative side effects led Hutton to successfully argue for the discontinuation of psychosurgery at the Burden. Hutton’s later research instead focused on the more spiritual aspects of psychiatric care, arguing for the importance of both religion and love in the treatment of neurosis and similar conditions.