Charles Darwin, Courtesy the Natural History Museum. © Natural History Museum
Darwin200 co-ordinator Bob Bloomfield talks to Culture24’s Chris Broughton about the ambitious project to celebrate Charles Darwin’s ideas.
Darwin200 is a national programme of events celebrating Charles Darwin’s scientific ideas and their impact around his two hundredth birthday on February 12 2009. Throughout the year Museums, Galleries and heritage groups will be responding to this auspicious occasion with exhibitions, education projects and dozens of events throughout the UK.
With 2009 well underway we felt it was high time we got in touch with the Natural History Museum’s Head of Innovation and Darwin 200 Coordinator, Dr Bob Bloomfield, to ask him some pertinent questions: How does he feel the project has progressed so far? Why is a tree being embedded in a gallery ceiling? And why does his address book include the details of a knitting group in Stroud?
Hello, Bob. Since you were part of the genesis of Darwin 200, perhaps you could give us an insight into how the celebrations have evolved.
Because we’re so embedded in evolutionary biology at the NHM, we became conscious of the impending bicentenary three years ago – it was certainly on our agenda as something on the horizon we were going to celebrate as a museum. As part of my role looking at the innovations programme it was something I brought up at a fairly early stage with some of our regular partners.
The long and short of it is that I ended up inviting a number of organisations to discuss whether of not they’d like to partner around Darwin celebrations, including the BBC, the Royal Society, the Charles Darwin Trust, the British Council and Cambridge University.
I’d looked at how some other UK celebrations had operated and thought it was quite important that Visit Britain were involved. So that little group came together and discussed the possibility and there was a strong agreement that it ought to be celebrated.
Darwin 200 is a pretty wide-ranging celebration, isn’t it?
To an extent, the perspectives that tend to occur around evolutionary biology in the public forum are very polarised, and generally focussed around an area we felt we wanted to get beyond – evolution versus creationism.
There are some very prominent voices on either side, particularly the science side. So we felt a celebration which would embrace many, many organisations and reach across different sectors of the community - not just science, but arts and heritage, reaching into the education sectors and so on - was the right way to go.
We wanted to have a UK-wide celebration recognising a great Briton, a man of huge influence and ideas. Genuinely, there was a huge amount to celebrate. That led us – 18 months ago - into the idea of setting up the Darwin 200 approach.
The book that started it all. The Orgin of the Species, first edition. © Natural History Museum
In a nutshell, what is the Darwin 200 approach?
In essence, what we’ve tried to achieve is fairly simple. There was never a multi-million pound pot of money to support a big, top-down activity but we were conscious as we spoke there were likely to be many organisations who wanted to celebrate on their own terms.
So the basic concept was that if we could set up a brand, and a mechanism where people could do their own thing but benefit from a major partnership, then we were likely to be supportive of the community who were engaged, and collectively we could do more than any one organisation alone.
Has the project grown in the way you anticipated?
Well, I think it’s grown in the way we hoped. We definitely saw the potential of what could be achieved, and obviously we’re still to see the full outcome of that, because there’s still almost a year of celebrations to go. We’re not finishing until the anniversary of ‘The Origin of the Species’ in November 2009. There’s a lot of stuff happening over that entire period – over 200 events.
Apart from the bicentenary, why is now a good time to celebrate Darwin?
I believe we’re at a unique point in our history. The pressures of human-induced change in the environment raises massively significant issues which society potentially faces, and if we aren’t equipped scientifically to address them then we really do face a huge potential threat.
Environmentally speaking, there’s very little we can do in our society today that can’t be traced back to Darwin’s research. When we think of globalised travel and the potential of evolving diseases, biodiversity loss and climate change and so on - everything you think of is underpinned by evolutionary biology. I think making people aware of those issues is as important if not more important than anything else we could be looking at in the course of the year.
But not all the organisations taking part are science-based, are they?
No, and part of the beauty of the year is that each organisation will have a slightly different angle on the subject. Some of the heritage organisations, for example, will be dwelling on the heritage aspect of Darwin’s work. But all of them are also looking forward in education terms.
Tania Kovats, Tree. © Natural History Museum
Which projects particularly interest you? Will you be making a date to see anything in particular?
Oh, that’s very difficult – and it would be unfair of me, as a co-ordinator, to pick one out. But I would like to highlight the initiatives by very small organisations who are really doing something unique and exceptional.
One of those is the Stroud Knitting Group, who are doing a piece called ‘Darwin’s Rejects’. Basically, it’s knitted artwork which they’re getting into various places to show. I think it’s a fantastic idea. One of the things I feel is really nice about the project is that it’s reinforcing Darwin’s ideas, but not through the usual suspects.
Another group, who make quilts, are doing a Bayeux Tapestry-style piece about the Beagle voyage. I really think those projects are gems – they’re done on very low resources, but are really creative, and I hope they capture people’s imagination.
How have things been going so far? What sort of response have you had from the public?
So far it’s been fabulous – the amount of interest in the projects that have so far emerged has been positive without a doubt. The amount of media interest has been tremendous and in terms of visitor numbers - at the museum, anyway - we’re doing very well.
Things will be moving up a gear in the next few months – in January, February and March there will be a lot of coverage on TV, and spring should see the unveiling of Tania Kovat’s TREE.
An entire tree inserted into the ceiling of the mezzanine gallery – that’s a pretty audacious idea. Do you approve?
Well, our founder Richard Owen was quite opposed to some of Darwin’s ideas and also disagreed with him on theological grounds. He had his own ideas about something similar to evolution, but believed there was a divine hand involved.
Consequently, the South Kensington museum building was designed to emulate a cathedral to nature. We’re very comfortable with that – we want people to be celebrating, and we want people to be awestruck in the power of nature and so on but obviously our underlying understanding of the natural process is very different. So we felt it was very fitting to respectfully look into the heart of the architecture and place something there which is really a recognition of Darwin’s contribution.
Finally, towards the end of the year, the Darwin Centre will be opening. A fitting close to the celebrations?
There will be lots of Darwin 200-related events after the Darwin Centre opens, but as far as the museum is concerned, it’ll be a real grand finale. One of the original drivers of the project was to encourage organisations to actually create a legacy beyond the year, whatever they’re producing - books or educational resources, for example.
The great thing about the Darwin Centre is that it’s all to do with future research – dealing with current day issues, understanding current biodiversity and its implications. I think it’s wholly in the spirit of the event – and the man it celebrates – to end with the opening of a major, contemporary, relevant research centre. That will be our contribution to the legacy of Darwin Year.
For more information about Darwin200 see
www.darwin200.org.
