The plastic figure stands on the precipice.
Made in 2009, this box is the only piece in the exhibition that was not in a sledge box. This box is a "rat box". It has holes in it that are just big enough to allow a rat in. It didn't have a trap in just some bait (a 'Mars bar' I think). There aren't any rats on Bird Island but near by on South Georgia; separated by a relatively short stretch of water, the rat population was rampant. The boxes were there as a way of monitoring the situation. If rats made it onto the island they could devastate ground nesting bird colonies. In 2018 South Georgia was declared rat free after an extentsive rat eradication programme.
The stick passing through the box is the remains of an old fur seal stick (a bodger) used to fend off aggressive fur seals when traveling through the massed ranks of seals on the beach. Fur seals during mating season can be quite aggressive. Employees on Bird Island are given broomsticks to deter the seals from biting them. They often end up quite short after the seals bite the ends off.
The plastic figure was a ''Britains' toy farm figure originally pushing a broom; the brush part of which had long disappeared before I bought it at a car boot sale.
The bright coloured pieces of plastic are 'flipper tags'. The scientists stationed on the base at Bird Island tag the seals for their survey work. When a seal dies, from illness, old age or from fighting with other seals the tags are collected and the number logged. A scientists kept them on his desk in sweet jar and kindly gave them to me - along with the sweet jar. The flipper tags say" Inform British Antarctic Survey" on the back.
As with all the other pieces in this exhibition it has its framed 'Bill of Lading' (BOL) on the front of the box. This is required to describe the items inside the box before it can be put onto the ship as cargo. In the gallery this device also explains to the viewer the more ambiguous and obscure items in the artpiece.
(Was part of the exhibtion 'Visions of Science', The Edge, University of Bath 2018)
The stick passing through the box is the remains of an old fur seal stick (a bodger) used to fend off aggressive fur seals when traveling through the massed ranks of seals on the beach. Fur seals during mating season can be quite aggressive. Employees on Bird Island are given broomsticks to deter the seals from biting them. They often end up quite short after the seals bite the ends off.
The plastic figure was a ''Britains' toy farm figure originally pushing a broom; the brush part of which had long disappeared before I bought it at a car boot sale.
The bright coloured pieces of plastic are 'flipper tags'. The scientists stationed on the base at Bird Island tag the seals for their survey work. When a seal dies, from illness, old age or from fighting with other seals the tags are collected and the number logged. A scientists kept them on his desk in sweet jar and kindly gave them to me - along with the sweet jar. The flipper tags say" Inform British Antarctic Survey" on the back.
As with all the other pieces in this exhibition it has its framed 'Bill of Lading' (BOL) on the front of the box. This is required to describe the items inside the box before it can be put onto the ship as cargo. In the gallery this device also explains to the viewer the more ambiguous and obscure items in the artpiece.
(Was part of the exhibtion 'Visions of Science', The Edge, University of Bath 2018)
The work is lit by a bulb inside the box.
|
As well as the fliper tags there is a photograph of the beach at Bird Island covered in seals.
|
The base comander protecting himself by wielding his mandatory broomstick.
The broken broomstick passes through the rat box using the two 'rat' sized entry points.
|
B. A. S. staff defend themselves against aggressive male seals during mating season. Unfortunately mating season coincided with the annual arrival of the ship with that years supplies. Supplies include new replacement broomsticks.
|
The 'Bill of Lading' has to describe what's in each consignment of cargo.
"Inform British Antarctic Survey"
|
The tags go through the box in the same way they pierce the seals flipper. The other half of the tag appears on the underneath of the box.
|
tagged seal. Photo: Bill Hunnewell
|
tagged seal. Photo: Jeremy Smith
|
Bird Island beach in fur seal mating season. Each seal guards its small piece of territory from other seals and human beings. They bite and bite will go septic.