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.