2007 - Karl Grimes’s ‘Dignified Kings Play Chess on Fine Green Silk’ project

The National Museum and Gallery of Photography jointly presented Dignified Kings Play Chess on Fine Green Silk, a body of work by Irish photographer Karl Grimes based on his artist-in-residency at the Natural History Museum. In photographs, drawings, lightboxes, text and sound, it re-interprets the museum ‘Dead Zoo’ collections and Victorian museum practices in Ireland. It also highlighted the work of the pioneering scientist R.M. Barrington, whose 20-year study of the migratory patterns of birds was conducted with the assistance of Irish lighthouse keepers and is an early example of participatory, ‘citizen’ science.

Image courtesy the artist.