Here are some of the artworks that will be shown in the exhibition.
Etched Entomology
Annette Marie Townsend
Collaborating Scientist; Assistant Professor Scott McArt, Cornell University
The series Etched Entomology was inspired by the scientific collections at Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales. Techniques normally used in printmaking, printed circuit board manufacturing and jewellery design have been combined in an innovative way to produce a series of closely observed images. Each image is hand drawn directly onto a copper surface, which is then etched, oxidised, sanded, scored and polished.
The oxidation process produces an outer surface layer on the copper plate, protecting the delicate copper insect. The etched drawings play on the themes of darkness and light, encasement, detail, repetition, order and protection, all observed within the museum environment.
Each handmade plate is unique and marked with an identifying series of letters and numbers, echoing the collection reference system employed by museums.
PolliNation Portraits
Professor Andrea Liggins
Collaborating scientist: Assistant Professor Scott McArt, Cornell University
Digital colour prints
Most people when asked to describe a pollinator will think of a honeybee or a bumblebee such as Bombus terrestris (Europe), not realising that there are 25,000 known species of bee in the world (about 4,000 in the USA and 250 in the UK). A quote from the British writer John Fowles suggests, “The greatest threat to our countryside is less the physical harm we do than a growing detachment from that reality”. These portraits attempt to address the separation of people from the diversity and richness of these wonderful and very important creatures. They were collected from around the world, Bolivia, Australia and Argentina for example, and from as far back as the 1800s.
This work originated with Andrea Liggins working in collaboration with Dr Andrew Lucas, photographing forgotten and overlooked landscapes, the wild, marshy fields of Wales and the forgotten pollinators themselves – Hoverflies. During a four-day visit to Cornell University, Liggins was introduced to the amazing insect collection (CUIC). She spent her visit making these portraits of bees, hoverflies and moths, assisted by a research student Paige Muniz.
Liggins says of the photographs “These are not sharply focused images, that show you what the bees and hoverflies look like in all their scientific detail but are meant to be portraits, that engage you with their ‘being’. I don’t know whether bees and hoverflies have personalities, but I saw each of them as an individual, full of character. I felt that I came to know each one, as a portrait artist would get to know the sitter and I hope that comes across.”
Hoverflies and Bio-mimicry Masquerades
Professor Karen Ingham
Collaborating scientists: Dr. Natasha de Vere and Dr. Andrew Lucas, National Botanic Garden of Wales and Natural Resources Wales
Digital textiles and giclée prints
Hoverflies are essential but under valued pollinators. Incredible bio-mimics they are often mistaken for bees and wasps and are a prime example of Batesian mimicry. Crucially they are also ‘promiscuous pollinators’, pollinating a wide range of plants. This is elegantly illustrated in the research of DeVere and Lucas with their Hoverflies ‘barcodes’, part of the groundbreaking Barcode Wales project. It is the Hoverfly’s ability to alter its appearance, its ‘bio-mimicry masquerading’ that intrigues Ingham and which she has explored in this digital textiles based project, extending earlier publicly engaged design research in ‘Pollinator Frocks’ https://www.kareningham.org.uk/pollinator-frocks/
Ingham’s interdisciplinary designs act as ‘prompts and provocations’; eye-catching designs, which are in effect ‘mini natural history lessons’, drawing the public into important scientific issues in a manner intended to engage and inspire.
The Hoverflies design concept plays on the remarkable skill of Hoverflies in mimicking so many other pollinating insects, alluding to a DNA spiral and the metamorphic changes from a simple brown Rhingia species to the bee like Volucella bombylans. The artist was also interested in using the bioinformatics data of De Vere and Lucas, which graphically demonstrates the breadth and importance of the Hoverflies pollination habitats. These informatics barcodes have been integrated into a retro style Gingham picnic cloth that acts as a reminder to ‘think before you swat’ as many Hoverflies are mistakenly killed by the public who think they are bees or wasps.
PolliNation 