Hunting Trophies and IKEA Wallpaper: Reflecting on the Representation of the Scientific Object

Abstract

As a visual artist, I collect, organize, and re present and continually reflect on that process. The life and work of Swedish botanist Carl von Linné continues to be significant in understanding the cultural practices of classification and representation. Images gathered in the University of Uppsala, at Linné’s preserved home in Hammerby outside of Uppsala, Sweden and from Linné’s samples stored by the Royal Society in London continue to infuse my art work. It was Linné who developed the binomial system of classification which is the basis of modern scientific classification. It was Linné who strived for a systematic representation of the natural object. Information was not real or useful to science unless it took a quantified form. Naming. Measuring. Representing. I am drawn to the similarities and differences of artistic and scientific practice. My focus lies in the ironies of that comparison. Currently I work with the natural object as it is represented in scientific collections and public display. I am interested in the meaning of the representation. My presentation to the ASSI&T Workshop would take the form of a visual presentation of the natural object, beginning in the 18th century with Linné, followed by subsequent developments in the representation of nature. Examples of my art work would be used to consider that history.