Speculative Zoology: Fictitious Examples of Factual Processes
Join us for a conversation and artist talk with Dougal Dixon, Scottish scientist/artist and founder of the speculative zoology genre, who will present an overview of his publications starting with After Man: A Zoology of the Future (1981), The New Dinosaurs: An Alternative Evolution (1988), The Future is Wild (2002), Greenworld Vols. 1 & 2 (2010), and more. Dixon will describe his use of book archetypes, such as natural field guides, sci-fi paperbacks, and pop-up books, as well as some never-before-seen artifacts and original drawings. Finally, Dixon will share some exciting news regarding the 40th anniversary of his seminal work After Man.
Note: Center for Book Arts will hold this event entirely online. A Zoom link will be sent in an email to all registrants.
About the Speaker
Dougal Dixon, Scottish scientist/artist and founder of the speculative zoology genre, is a full-time writer and book editor specializing in the earth sciences, and has many children’s books and encyclopaedias to his name. His most notable books are After Man: A Zoology of the Future, in which he explained the workings of evolution by postulating the types of animals that may evolve in times to come; The New Dinosaurs, in which he described the zoogeography of the world by describing what life might be like today had the dinosaurs not become extinct; and Time Exposure (aka The Age of Dinosaurs) in collaboration with wildlife photographer Jane Burton, in which extinct animals are dramatically portrayed in lifelike photographs.
He has made several television appearances, and acted as a consultant and animator, as well as presenter for a Japanese television programme about evolution, during which he worked in the Serengeti, the rainforest of Costa Rica and the Galapagos Islands.
About the Exhibition
Interspecies Futures [IF] is the first survey of bookworks by leading international practitioners from the contemporary fields of bio-art and speculative design who have turned to the codex as a tool for the proposal of alternative human-nonhuman scenarios.
![Detail image of a binder with a pocket encasing a book with the title, DNA SEQUENCE OF THE [indiscernible word]. There is a photograph on the left with organic textures that are also indiscernible.](https://centerforbookarts.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Mermaid-scaled.jpg)
