Evolution is looking at you

Evolution was at work when eyespots eventually appeared on the wings of butterflies and moths. This trick was so successful, that it was repeated over and over again. Eyespots are a form of mimicry in which a spot on an animal body resembles an eye of a different animal, helping to deceive potential predators. This is evolution following evolution: eyespots developed only when the evolution of eyes themselves was well underway. Depicted is a selection of eye-spotted Lepidoptera. They sit on an ancient oak tree that, as a symbol of the evolutionary tree, was borrowed from Ernst Haeckel, Darwin’s ardent German propagandist.

Evolution is looking at you
   2012, watercolour (39 x 27 cm)

 Images of butterflies and moths are based on:
1 (Upper) Common Buckeye / Junonia coenia 
2 (Centre, left) Io moth / Automeris io 
3 (Centre, right) ( A Saturnid)  / Automeris egeus
4 (Bottom, left) Owl butterfly / Caligo teucer
5 (Bottom, right) Polyphemus Moth / Antheraea polyphemus

Natural selection is looking at you

The succession of species, their "blooming" periods and extinctions, puzzled 19th Century naturalists.  Then, Charles Darwin identified natural selection as the key mechanism of evolutionary change. In this  image, Darwin's "fancy" eyes are the eyespots on moth wings that mimic the eyes of predators, an iconic  example of change through natural selection. The bowler hat is a reference to the surrealist painter,  René Magritte, for whom it was a symbol of the bourgeois. Indeed, in the typically narrow mindset of  Darwin’s day, even hinting at procreation was not done. So it certainly marks his genius that he opened  his eyes to the vistas offered by natural selection -- despite his hat..

Natural selection is looking at you I

Natural selection is looking at you II

The image is based on a well-known photographic portrait of Charles Darwin and stylizeded renderings of  Io moth (Automeris io) and an unidentified Owl moth
Media: Acrylic spraypaint/stencil, watercolour; Dimensions: DIN A4 ;  Production date: 2012

(In my previous Blog-message, I presented the plain spay-paint version of this worrk)

Windows on Evolution

Charles Darwin, 212 stencil /acrylic  (Din A4)

Science-Art-Nature organises a virtual exhibit “Windows on Evolution: An Artistic Celebration of Chares Darwin”  commemorating coming Darwin Day, February 12, 2013.

I decided to participate in this on-line exhibition. To get in the mood and to kick my entry off,  I made a stencil of the portrait of Charles Darwin, looking through evolutionary eyes. Then I made prints with acrylic spray paint.

 It is is not yet my entry. There is more to come in the near future.

Sarsia siphonophora II (B 657)

Sarsia siphonophora (B 657) II 
2012 watercolour 
(ca 55 x 75 cm)

The previous entry showed a detail of the colony building jellyfish species Sarsia siphonophora.

In this blog I present an impression of the complete animal.
This image is of course not true to life: everything (shapes, curls, colours) is exagerated for great effect.

Haeckel, 1879

In Ernst Haeckel's  
Das System der Medusen
(publ.: Jena: Gustav Fischer, 1879)
the real preparatory material is found on Plate 1, figure 4.

Sarsia siphonophora

Sarsia siphonophora, detail study. 2012 watercolour (29 x 21.5 cm)

Sarsia siphonophora is another colony building jellyfish species. The study presented here shows a detail.  

Apolemia uvaria (B 201)

The Blaschka glass model 201, portraying Apolemia uvaria, was based on a figure printed in one of Carl Gegenbaur's articles: "Beiträge zur näheren Kenntniss der Schwimmpolypen (Siphonophoren)", published in: Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Zoologie, Band 5. (pp 285-344. Taf. XVIII, Fig. 1). This journal was published in 1854. His illustration shows a young individual of this siphonophore species. Blaschka copied the image, translated it into glass, and a copy of this model was sold to the University in Liège. This in turn served as  an example for this study in watercolour. 

Apolemia uvaria (B 201), 2012 watercolour (42x29,7 cm)

Go to my blog entry on Praya cymbiformis (B215) to read more on the influence of Gegenbauer on Blaschka glass model making. 

MONDO VETRO - histoires naturelles

14 September - 31 december 2012
the exhibition
MONDO VETRO - histoires naturelles
works by the master glass worker
Vittorio Costantini

will be on show in
Musée d'Opale Sud
60 Rue de l'impératrice
62600 Berck-sur-Mer
France