On this page we are collating articles that are particularly pertinent to our themes and
contemporary arts practice.
We aim to offer creative support to a set of artistic projects that will unfold in future years from this AHRC-funded work
Have any suggestions for new material? Send to Dr Sara Barnes at s.barnes@eca.ac.uk.

Beer, Gillian; 'The Evolution of the Novel.'
Originally published in A.C. Fabian (ed), Evolution,, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998
In chapter 6 of this edited volume exploring ideas about scientific and cultural evolution, Gillian Beer argues that evolution in a 'progressive' sense of natural selection is redundant when considering the trajectory of the novel. Beer demonstrates Darwin's concern with procedures and processes in his writing and how evolutionary ideas are important in the narrative of works of fiction.
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Gerratana, Valentino; 'Marx and Darwin.'
Originally published in New Left Review I/82, November-December 1973
What was the significance of Darwin's work in the thought of Marx and Engels? This is the question posed here by Valentino Gerratana who argues that their position on historical materialism and its relationship to the natural sciences preceded the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859. Gerratana then develops the essay by way of Malthus and Huxley to include philosophy, social sciences and religion.
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Gessert, George; 'A History of Art Involving DNA.'
Originally published in Art Papers, September/October 1996
The essay was revised and expanded and appeared in LifeScience, proceedings of Ars Electronica, G. Stocker and C.Schopf (eds), Vienna and New York, Springer, 1999 (German and English). A second revised version appeared in Biomediale, Dmitry Bulatov (ed), The National Publishing House, Kaliningrad, Russia, 2004,(Russian and English.
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Larson, Barbara; 'Evolution and Degeneration in the Early Work of Odilon Redon.'
Originally published in Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide, Vol. 2, No. 2, Spring 2003
Barbara Larson places the hybrid 'monsters' of Odilon Redon's art in the context of fin-de-siecledebates around evolutionary theory. Detailing Redon's familiarity with the work of, among others, plant physiologist Armand Clavaud and evolutionary theorist Ernst Haeckel, Larson asserts that Redon was above all a Darwinist.
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Najafi, Sina; 'The Language of the Bees: An Interview with Hugh Raffles.'
Originally published in Cabinet, Issue 25, Spring 2007
Professor Hugh Raffles is currently writing The Illustrated Insectopedia (forthcoming, Pantheon). In this interview with Sina Najafi he discusses animal behaviour, the work of zoologist Karl von Frisch, Nazi ideology, and ethologist Konrad Lorenz and animal instinct. The discussion moves from questions of epistemology to ontology and closes with a brief excursion into animal suffering and humanism.
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Nochlin, Linda; 'The Darwin Effect: Introduction.'
Originally published in Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide, Vol. 2, No. 2, Spring 2003
In this introduction to a special edition of the journal, art historian Linda Nochlin considers the nineteenth century milieu of evolutionary debate she describes as the Darwin Effect. First suggesting how this provided a rich millieu for artists, Nochlin then focuses upon how this was manifest in the representation of a species (the horse) and finally the relationship between evolution and gender theory.
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Pyne, Kathleen; 'On Women and Ambivalence in the Evolutionary Topos.'
Originally published in Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide, Vol. 2, No. 2, Spring 2003
Set against an American backdrop of Darwin's evolutionary theory and it's interpretation as human progression by Herbert Spencer, Kathleen Pyne argues that the uncertainty of the opposing positions of the descent and ascent of man was played out in images of women. Here she considers the work of artist Thomas Dewing within the dual tenets of bodiliness and spirituality, femininity and masculinity.
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Turner, Christopher; 'A Lot of Gall.'
Originally published in Cabinet, Issue 25, Spring 2007
Before he became a sex researcher, Alfred Kinsey was a zoologist and on his death bequeathed 7.5 million specimens to the Museum of Natural History in New York. Christopher Turner explores the drive of a man dedicated to taxonomy and the search for the origin of species of the gall wasp.
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Wertheim, Margaret; 'Figuring Life.'
Originally published in Originally published in Cabinet, Issue 27, Fall 2007,
Author Margaret Wertheim is founder and director of the L.A. based Institute for Figuring, dedicated to the aesthetic and poetic dimensions of science and mathematics. In this article, Wertheim discusses the Tree of Life, beginning with Darwin's sketch (the only illustration included in the 1859 edition of 'Origin of Species'), Ernst Haeckel's diagrams in 'General Morphology' (1886) and 'The Evolution of Man' (1879) and closing with Dr Norman Pace's pinwheel 'map of molecular machinary' founded in the chemistry of organisms.
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