Output details

Amazonia

The ‘Amazonia’ series interweaves scientific, aesthetic and cultural paradigms to offer insights into the huge diversity of living organisms and the space they occupy in the planet’s evolution. It resulted from research conducted in the Natural History Museum, London and a field expedition to the Peruvian Amazon. The primary inquiry, based on the theory of operational aesthetics, was to investigate how contemporary art can act as a trigger to provoke a deeper appreciation of the natural world and to understand the importance of biodiversity and the effects its loss will have on climate change. The thirty-seven commissioned artefacts in different media and formats were specifically created for the Jerwood Gallery at the Natural History Museum to stimulate different sensations and provoke different audience responses. The artworks focused attention on the myriad of species that depend on the eco-equilibrium of the Amazon and prompted the public to reflect on the fragile balance and coexistence of this environment.

As part of the commissioning process the researchers engaged with the museum collections including entomology, botany, palaeontology and the library archive as well as accompanying scientists on the field trip to the Amazon. This led to a distinctive range of approaches, including macrophotographs, a diptych video projection, and three 1:1 porcelain sculpture casts of dinosaur fossils.

The project resulted in invitations to speak at Tate Britain in partnership with the Royal Society, at the Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris; and resulted in a new commission to tour Chicago, Paris, Lille and Turin. The Amazonia Orta website achieved 47,000 hits by November 2010 and featured in The Ecologist, and on the BBC.