Art that smells like a lab
You can probably guess who this is.
But can you guess what he’s made of…?
That’s Darwin sketched in living E. coli bacteria, of course.
And who but T. Ryan Gregory would have done such a thing? (Actually his graduate student Joao Lima did it.) This is the same T. Ryan Gregory who agreed to play Spore for weeks with me and a few other scientists for this scathing review of the game in Science.
Ryan studies genomes, how they evolve and generate biodiversity. But he does other cool stuff, too. He speaks his mind with a great science blog called Genomicron. He has an online shop where he sells hip geek threads. And now he’s outdone himself by launching an online art gallery devoted to paintings made out of microbes:
Created by Eshel Ben-Jacob
The original granddaddy of microbial art turns out to be none other than Alexander “Magic Bullet” Fleming, credited with discovering penicillin and hence saving humanity from immense microbe-induced suffering (at least until multiple drug-resistant bugs take over).
Check this out.
Made of microbes? You got it!
“Even in Fleming’s time this technique failed to receive much attention or approval. Apparently he prepared a small exhibit of bacterial art for a royal visit to St Mary’s by Queen Mary. The Queen was ‘not amused and hurried past it’ even though it included a patriotic rendition of the Union Jack in bacteria.” (From a 2002 biography of Fleming)
Oh how times have changed. Who wouldn’t want a microbial portrait on their wall?
Keep an eye out for next week’s issue of Science. It will be featuring one of the microbial objets d’art from Ryan’s gallery.
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How to make Stephen Colbert eat cat food
Yes, I caused Stephen Colbert to eat cat food on TV. But let me explain…
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Galileo in Senegal
A time travel experiment. Impossible? Yes probably, but it didn’t stop us from trying. Our goal was to introduce astronomy to people in remote African villages to see how Galileo might have been received if he brought telescopes.
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The ultimate film festival for science geeks
What to do after a cell biology PhD? Alexis Gambis got a haircut, moved to Brooklyn, and is now the director of the Imagine Science Film Festival.
Niall Hamilton says:
My name is Niall Hamilton, I’m one of the microbial artists involved with the microbial art site. I started doing microbial art shortly after completing an honours degree (1st class) in microbiology, it started while I was working at an industrial/environmental microbiology consulting laboratory in 2002. During my degree I had very little to do with the fungal side of microbiology and the amazing variety of colour/morphology in the fungal species really struck me when I started to get involved with the environmental microbiology. (I since went on to complete a medical degree [& now work as a doctor]though I still do some microbiology part-time when I can.)
Microbiology is an area that often comes across as quite dry & while working as a microbiologist, I was looking for a way to express my enthusiasm for it to my friends. Christmas was approaching so I thought I’d do a personal ‘microbe’ Xmas card. So taking a few species isolated from windowsill dust, I decided to swab out an appropriate seasonal image onto an agar plate. It was quite well received and I thought, why stop with just seasonal images? So I continue to culture more microbial art & photograph it. I do a mix of the images created with the microbes as the ‘paint’ and micro/macrophotographs that are a bit more abstract but demonstrate the beauty and elegance of the fungal forms in microbiology.
I strongly believe that science-based art is a easy way to remind us of the depths & mysteries of the world around us. For example – the ‘snowman’ image created uses yeast isolated from the edge of a sink plughole – a small area of slime that itself is a complex multi-species biofilm. Microbiology is a fascinating area and hopefully pieces that are made from microbes isolated from windowsill dust and sink slime will make people wonder a bit more about the microbial world around us and maybe even spark an interest in it.
When Ryan contacted me with the idea of setting a site to showcase microbial art, I was delighted to be involved. It’s the obvious next step for exposing people to this unique form of art that reflects a passion for microbiology.
October 28, 2009 @ 7:58 pm