Artist Anna Tewungwa explores climate change and insects at the Hunterian Museum, Glasgow

Invisible Dust has partnered with Jeanne Robinson, Entomology Curator at the Hunterian Museum, Glasgow, for Hack the ARC: ‘Co-Curating for Climate Change.’ This project, featuring artist Anna Tewungwa, involved collection visits, tours, and a workshop with seven interdisciplinary academics and ARC staff. Tewungwa’s research into the museum’s insect collection has inspired a new proposal exploring biomimicry and its connection to environmental impact.

As part of Hack the ARC, artist Anna Tewungwa was selected by Invisible Dust to develop an artistic response to the Hunterian Museum natural history collections. Her research included collection visits guided by Jeanne Robinson, leading to a new artwork proposal that explores biomimicry and the ironic tension between human ideals and their environmental impact. We supported Anna as an emerging artist, including mentoring by UnNatural History artist Tania Kovats. This project was successful in applying to Hack the ARC at Glasgow University.

Anna’s research into the Museum’s insect collection offered insights into their unique qualities and how they have been studied, collected and preserved over time. Her resulting artwork proposal explores the interconnected roles of insects in ecosystems, emphasising their importance, and how the study of natural history collections can deepen our understanding of ecological and historical relationships.

Anna’s interest in biomimicry—the solving of human design challenges by learning from and imitating strategies found in nature—led her to notice incidental instances of this phenomenon in everyday objects. From food packaging to plastic toys, she observed the mimicry of natural forms and a contrast between the intentional and the unintended, often wasteful, manifestations of biomimicry in consumer products. Discarded items often resembling natural organisms become part of urban ecosystems, creating an ironic tension between human ideals and their environmental impact.

Anna has proposed an artwork using different artmaking materials to unite, organise and compare the characteristics which biological specimens and throw-away objects have in common. The proposed artwork would feature a combination of two- and three-dimensional representations of specimens, displayed sequentially to illustrate their interconnectedness. 

Utilising a grid system reminiscent of museum taxonomy cases, the piece would be hung at eye level to engage viewers through striking colour relationships and tactile qualities found in insect specimens. Anna aims to create an accessible and visually appealing piece that promotes environmental awareness while celebrating the educational value of natural history collections.

This work would speak strongly to ARC research on urban biodiversity and waste management (GALLANT) with potential overlap for exploring nanostructure in nature, form and function.

UnNatural History
This project is part of UnNatural History, Invisible Dust’s ongoing enquiry into the importance of art and science to natural history collections and their role in understanding climate change. Explore previous projects.