Hyman Shrand
1921—1999

Dr. Hyman Shrand was a noted pediatrician, artist, Sherlock Holmes buff, writer, poet and raconteur. Although medicine was his first love. Dr. Shrand once wrote that he had for 50 years been a painter trapped in the body of a pediatrician. A self-described primitive folk painter. Dr. Shrand began painting almost daily after his retirement in 1983. Self-portraits, portraits of his patients and members of his family, animals, clowns and circus scenes, and boats were the primary focus of his brilliantly colored canvases.

Dr. Shrand came to Cape Cod to retire, but missed working with children. He was pressed into service at the Wellfleet branch of Outer Cape Health Services by Dr. Leonard Alberts, then medical director at OCHS in Provincetown and Wellfleet. Dr. Alberts had worked with Dr. Shrand, the former chief of pediatric medicine, at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge.

“He was an incredible man, a great guy and great pediatrician,” said Dr. Alberts. “When I was at Mount Auburn, everyone there loved him. Through our friendship, I got him to see patients again. He provided a great service to a lot of kids until health problems made him stop work. He was quite a sweet guy.”

Berta Walker, in whose gallery Dr. Shrand’s work was featured, said it was Dr. Shrand’s integrity and humor that made his paintings so wonderful. “He put himself, his cat and his wife in so many pictures,” she said, “and he tried all kinds of things. He had his Picasso period and his Gauguin period, but he never intended to be influenced by them. He spoofed the great artists, and with great integrity.”

Walker said she was proud to have shown his work in her gallery. “All of the town’s really serious artists like Resika and Boghosian came and told him how much they really liked his work,” Walker said. “What a wonderful thing to happen so late in his life. I feel thrilled and honored he got the feedback professionally from artists as good as he was.”

Shrand began painting after his wife, Hannah, presented him with a “pot of paints.” While he had no formal art schooling, he taught himself from his collection of 600 art books, with the works of German masters as key influences. He painted in a primitive Folk Art style which he called Primitive Expressionism, and used to say that each one of this paintings told a story. His subject matter was taken from his life, including animals, cats in particular.
 Born in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1921, Dr. Shrand graduated with honors from the University of Cape Town Medical School. He continued post-graduate studies in Edinburgh and London, working at such hospitals as Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children, Guys Hospital, Saint Mary’s Hospital, and Queen Charlotte’s Hospital. Appointed Chief of Pediatrics at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge in 1970, he was also the Director of the Home Medical Service and Home Care Program for Sick Children and for the Tufts-New England Medical Center. Shrand is also a Member of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and a fellow of the South African College of Physicians, Surgeons and Gynecologists, as well as many other professional societies. Among his many hobbies, he has served as a pediatric consultant to the Franklin Park Zoo.