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August 19th is World Photography Day, so what better time to feature some beautifully manipulated images of some of our favousite specimens?

Jim Naughten is a photographer who specialises in the combination of photography and digital painting. These images are from his “Eremozoic” project, which was exhibited at the Michael Hoppen Gallery in 2021. The leafy sea dragon was also displayed as a pair of images, designed to be seen through a stereoscopic viewer

“Eremozoic is a continuation of my practice but undoubtedly my most important project to date. I’m interested in how, in the evolutionary blink of an eye, humans have come to dominate and overwhelm the planet and how far our relationship with the natural world has fundamentally and dangerously shifted from that of our ancestors.”

Jim Naughten, 2021

Recently Jim visited the Cole Museum again, to take photographs for a new project. He set up his camera both in the museum, and in the fluid specimen store room, where he picked out some of our marine specimens to depict. We can’t wait to see how they turn out!

If you’d like to have a try at photographing museum specimens yourself, we are more than happy for you to take photos in the museum. If you’re on social media, you can tag us on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook – we’d love to see the museum from your point of view.