Unity Principle
The title of the work has a deliberate duality. I was introduced to the idea of the Unity Principle by my Professor of Biochemistry at London, Jack Pridham, a gentle and gifted man who could un-weave the complexities of biochemistry with the ease of a natural story-teller. In my first ever University lecture he burned into me the idea that life was a great family, unified by evolution.
The works in this exhibition are derived from expeditions to Belize and Greenland in 2008. Here there is greater emphasis on Belize but the two regions are united in the drawings shown on the walls. My first trip to Belize, back in 1991, was as a working scientist with Edinburgh University studying greenhouse gas release, specifically nitrous oxides, from soils. In January 2008 I revisited the tropical rainforest of Belize as an artist documenting the work of scientists from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh.
The latest expedition was based at Las Cuevas Research Station, an important research facility located in the heart of the Chiquibul Forest Reserve. The station occupies a central area within 300 million hectares of the largest remaining intact rainforest north of the Amazon. This research station includes the Conservation Management Institute, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh, Arcadia University and the Forestry Department of Belize as its partners. The Chiquibul is a Biodiversity Hotspot.
At Las Cuevas I followed the methods employed by working scientists as classification and plant collecting occured in the field. I documented several aspects of the visual culture of science, including the paraphernalia associated with doing science. The processes of science were examined by means of photography, drawing and discussion. I wanted the visual representations to communicate with both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
Many of images in the drawings were identified to the family level in the field. Other drawings present images of plants that have been recorded and identified by others in Central America. Two drawings (1 and 8) show graphical data of changes in the Greenland icecap resulting from climate change. The series of eight drawings on the wall are continuous. This work, then, is a statement about the interconnectedness of complex systems and the continuum of life in the biosphere.
The work in the cases includes photographs of the research laboratory at Chiquibul and its immediate surrounds. The ribbons were used in the field as part of the scientific work. Other documentation from my times in Belize are displayed.
The leitmotif of the work is phylogeny, the evolutionary relatedness of organisms. The form of visualisation used was inspired by academic text representations of speciation. The drawing Phylogeny shows this.
In some ways this work addresses what Martin Kemp calls “structural intuitions” - those factors common to both the arts and the sciences. The title also argues against separating the cultures of art and science.
Hamer Dodds
Edinburgh, March 31st 2009
Acknowledgements
Chapal Bol and Chris Minty for their help whist staying at Las Cuevas.
The poem was written by New York poet Martha LaBare in response to the Unity Principle drawings and her knowledge of the Chiquibul. Martha is Associate Professor of English at Bloomfield College and has held a fellowship in poetry at Princeton University. Thanks M!
The work would not have been possible without the help of many working scientists at the RBGE. Thank you for your help.
The works in this exhibition are derived from expeditions to Belize and Greenland in 2008. Here there is greater emphasis on Belize but the two regions are united in the drawings shown on the walls. My first trip to Belize, back in 1991, was as a working scientist with Edinburgh University studying greenhouse gas release, specifically nitrous oxides, from soils. In January 2008 I revisited the tropical rainforest of Belize as an artist documenting the work of scientists from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh.
The latest expedition was based at Las Cuevas Research Station, an important research facility located in the heart of the Chiquibul Forest Reserve. The station occupies a central area within 300 million hectares of the largest remaining intact rainforest north of the Amazon. This research station includes the Conservation Management Institute, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh, Arcadia University and the Forestry Department of Belize as its partners. The Chiquibul is a Biodiversity Hotspot.
At Las Cuevas I followed the methods employed by working scientists as classification and plant collecting occured in the field. I documented several aspects of the visual culture of science, including the paraphernalia associated with doing science. The processes of science were examined by means of photography, drawing and discussion. I wanted the visual representations to communicate with both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
Many of images in the drawings were identified to the family level in the field. Other drawings present images of plants that have been recorded and identified by others in Central America. Two drawings (1 and 8) show graphical data of changes in the Greenland icecap resulting from climate change. The series of eight drawings on the wall are continuous. This work, then, is a statement about the interconnectedness of complex systems and the continuum of life in the biosphere.
The work in the cases includes photographs of the research laboratory at Chiquibul and its immediate surrounds. The ribbons were used in the field as part of the scientific work. Other documentation from my times in Belize are displayed.
The leitmotif of the work is phylogeny, the evolutionary relatedness of organisms. The form of visualisation used was inspired by academic text representations of speciation. The drawing Phylogeny shows this.
In some ways this work addresses what Martin Kemp calls “structural intuitions” - those factors common to both the arts and the sciences. The title also argues against separating the cultures of art and science.
Hamer Dodds
Edinburgh, March 31st 2009
Acknowledgements
Chapal Bol and Chris Minty for their help whist staying at Las Cuevas.
The poem was written by New York poet Martha LaBare in response to the Unity Principle drawings and her knowledge of the Chiquibul. Martha is Associate Professor of English at Bloomfield College and has held a fellowship in poetry at Princeton University. Thanks M!
The work would not have been possible without the help of many working scientists at the RBGE. Thank you for your help.