New World Birdlife

New World Birdlife
2011

Media: sugar paper exposed to sunlight

Size: 400 x 500mm (x16)

Exhibited:

2011 – Cuculus Prospectus (one person exhibition), Beldam Gallery, Brunel University.

About this work:

New World Birdlife was made by ‘burning’ images—using sunlight—into low-grade sugar paper, exploiting its natural photosensitivity. These images are displayed in low-light conditions in order to prolong their life. In time they may fade, disappearing altogether. Sugar paper is named after the poor quality paper used to wrap sugar loaves imported from the New World during the Atlantic slave trade. Images for this work were sourced from William E. D. Scott, Bird Studies: An Account of the Land Birds of Eastern North America, in the Alexander Ornithology Library in Oxford.  Most images in the book are of dead birds, prompting further connections to Jean-Jacques Audubon and his contemporaries, whose pre-photographic wildlife illustrations were made using dead specimens—hunted and killed for the specific purpose of image making.  This is a reminder that we do not have to look too hard in natural history collections to see bullet holes in the mounted, taxidermied specimens on display.