Project Overview

Across a series of photographs and video animations (each presented on miniature LCD screens), Best digitally ‘reintroduces’ a number of indigenous birds and insects, plants, mammals and amphibians — marsh warblers, ground beetles, Fen orchids, water voles and common frogs amongst them — into landscapes where they are now seldom or no longer seen. Using specimens from local museum collections, Best employs simple techniques to place them within a digital diorama of their previous habitats, although the stylised nature of the works, in which the wildlife does not seem quite to ‘belong’ or fit in situ, produces a disquieting effect — reminding us that what we have lost can never really be fully recovered. Where once these species were virtually extinct, they have now returned, but only virtually.

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