It’s been said that Earth without art is just, “Eh.” And that our world, without insects, would fall apart.
In the current McIntosh Gallery exhibit, Insect as Idea, art and insects converge to paint a poignant picture of the beauty in biodiversity.
The show “is a fusion of art and science,” said gallery curator Helen Gregory. “It examines insects within a multi-species framework, considering the role that they play throughout ecological systems, while also touching on the historical aspects of colonization.”
The idea of the exhibit was originally conceived by visual arts professor and director of museum and curatorial studies, Kirsty Robertson. Gregory collaborated with Nina Zitani, curator of the Zoological Collections in Western’s department of biology, to bring Robertson’s vision to life.
Global specimens
Central to the show’s theme is a display of insect specimens in historical Riker mounts, from a larger collection Zitani oversees and uses in her research and teaching. Zitani is hoping this public debut of the specimens will spark appreciation and awe, and for some visitors, a changed perspective.
“Insects have this reputation for being gross, ugly and disgusting,” she said. “But here’s an opportunity, through these museum specimens from Western’s collection, to see their beauty. Each Riker mount alone is beautiful, but when you put them all together like this, it really makes an impact. I also hope people will come away appreciating the diversity of insects. They are the most diverse organisms on earth.”
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
With some mounts dating back to 1928, the display features approximately 600 species from around the world, including those from south American rainforests, India, southeast Asia, north America and Africa. Among them, an endangered Himalayan species, which speaks to one of the show’s underlying messages.
“Insects in this case are treated as an indicator of ecological health, as measured by insect biodiversity, which, of course, sadly, is on the decline,” Gregory said.
Ecological artists
The exhibit also features contemporary artists whose practices have a strong focus on ecology, biodiversity, the environment and Indigenous worldviews. The works include a vibrant painting by Christi Belcourt, who intertwines bees, birds, strawberries, and other native plants to underscore the interconnectedness of living things within the natural world.
Christi Belcourt, This Painting is a Mirror 2012. Acrylic on canvas. On loan from the Indigenous Art Collection, Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada. Photographer: Lawrence Cook
With his signature sense of whimsy, Jude Griebel takes inspiration from the sub-genre of Victorian art called, ‘anthropomorphic illustration.’ Through it, he imagines a tiny entomological protest against the current ecological crisis.
Jude Griebel, Small Dissent (detail) 2022. Carved wood, adhesives, wire, acrylic. Courtesy of the artist
Artist Jennifer Murphy combines images culled from old nature books to create composite forms highlighting the complexity of ecological relationships.
Jennifer Murphy, Walking Leaf Butterfly 2022. Collage of cut images from second-hand books sewn together with thread. Image courtesy of the artist and Clint Roenisch Gallery.
“I love the broad appeal of this show,” Gregory said. “Anybody who’s interested in contemporary art will enjoy it. And, at the same time, there will be a lot of interest from lepidopterists.”
Gregory and Zitani will be joined by some of the artists on Thursday, May 12, for a virtual discussion on how their work has been influenced by environmental issues and multi-species ecologies.
LONDON (AP) — With a few daubs of a paintbrush, the Brontë sisters have got their dots back.
More than eight decades after it was installed, a memorial to the three 19th-century sibling novelists in London’s Westminster Abbey was amended Thursday to restore the diaereses – the two dots over the e in their surname.
The dots — which indicate that the name is pronounced “brontay” rather than “bront” — were omitted when the stone tablet commemorating Charlotte, Emily and Anne was erected in the abbey’s Poets’ Corner in October 1939, just after the outbreak of World War II.
They were restored after Brontë historian Sharon Wright, editor of the Brontë Society Gazette, raised the issue with Dean of Westminster David Hoyle. The abbey asked its stonemason to tap in the dots and its conservator to paint them.
“There’s no paper record for anyone complaining about this or mentioning this, so I just wanted to put it right, really,” Wright said. “These three Yorkshire women deserve their place here, but they also deserve to have their name spelled correctly.”
It’s believed the writers’ Irish father Patrick changed the spelling of his surname from Brunty or Prunty when he went to university in England.
Raised on the wild Yorkshire moors, all three sisters died before they were 40, leaving enduring novels including Charlotte’s “Jane Eyre,” Emily’s “Wuthering Heights” and Anne’s “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.”
Rebecca Yorke, director of the Brontë Society, welcomed the restoration.
“As the Brontës and their work are loved and respected all over the world, it’s entirely appropriate that their name is spelled correctly on their memorial,” she said.
