Drawing Nature : speculative taxonomies at the intersection of analogue and digital approaches to drawing

Abstract

Drawing Nature investigates the abiding relevance of Linnaean taxonomy on our awareness of human/nature relationships. It examines the local and globally significant specimen collection of Alexander Macleay as a paradigm for taxonomical assemblages and methods of natural history collecting and documenting. Referencing drawing’s role as an epistemological system for understanding and documenting natural phenomena, my creative approach is both empirical and speculative as I reimagine modes of classification that underpin the methodologies for representing nature in art. This research critiques Linnaean binary logic as inherently exploitative and anthropocentric by exploring a network of creative authorship that entwines and transcends dyadic themes and processes. Oscillating between analogue and digital, micro and macroscopic, my body of work investigates how expanded drawing can collapse boundaries between the corporeal and virtual, spectator and artwork, human and environment. This research analyses how a contemporary art practice can reveal a Linnaean ordering of the environment as an enabler of colonial conquest and exploitation. It reimagines systems of natural classification and offers an alternative biological analogy, the rhizome, to illustrate respectful and cooperative human/nature interrelationships.