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Some protist-y art

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American


For me, the second more relaxing activity after microscopy is vector art. And then regular art. (This excludes non-activities, such as napping in the sun, and staring at life passing by. That's all I'd do if one didn't have to work -- watch things.) Since I'm not often creative with my subject matter, the art is usually based on protists. Some people make abstract paintings by exploding paint over canvas, some arrange objects in rooms to form shapes and shadows; I doodle protists.

Spending hours at the 'scope helps get a three dimensional visualisation of the microbial world; ultimately, microscopy becomes akin to wandering around in the woods and being a naturalist, immersed in an intuitive world with volume. The only thing that's missing is sound. (I wonder if protists make sounds...) It's fun to try to transmit some of that three dimensional world into art, since we can't really see it otherwise. You can pretend you're a naturalist sketching in the forest, trying to go for realism (with artistic license):

Or even more artistic license:


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Cartoonised 3D Paramecium. Next victim is a euglyphid (testate amoeba), below: (couldn't figure out how to incorporate the surface scales with this style)

Or you can go full-on stylised. Since I did my undergrad in the Northwest, and the upcoming big protist conference is in Vancouver, been trying to replicate the local First Nations art styles. First attempt: Telonema, a marine flagellate (though I've seen one in freshwater...).

Trimastix, an excavate occasionally found in soil and rotting leaves:

(Upon request, Trimastix prints are available here.)

And sometimes you can just be silly ;-)

That's it for now; don't want to exhaust my meager collection right away ;-)

(And feel free to contact me if you'd like to use anything, I'll be happy to help!)

About Psi Wavefunction

I first encountered the wonders of the protist realm back in childhood, when a murky droplet of pond scum was revealed by the microscope to entail an alien world in its own right. It took another decade to discover there was a field and a community dedicated to these organisms, and I bade farewell to the study of more familiar big things. As a kid I was also fascinated by tales of exploration of the New World, as well as those of fantasy worlds. I was then sad that the age of surveying new landmasses on earth was over, and that human extraterrestrial adventures are unlikely to happen within our lifetimes. It seemed everything was discovered already. But that could hardly be further from the truth -- all that is necessary to begin one's own Age of Exploration is a new approach or perspective, and a healthy does of imagination. Since reality has conjured far more than the human mind alone ever could, science yields a way to write stories much wilder than fiction. All one needs to access the alien world of microbes around (and inside) them is a shift of scale by simple glass sphere.
I'm currently finishing up my undergraduate degree in Vancouver and in transition career-wise, hopefully to end up in graduate school soon. I was born in Russia (and speak the language) and spent most of my life in US and Canada. In addition to protists, I'm fascinated by evolution, including that of culture and languages, diversity and biology of cells and how they self-organise, linguistics and anthropology, particularly of the less talked-about cultures, sociology of science and plenty of totally random things that snag my attention.
Banner image was kindly post-processed and enhanced by my friend: an accomplished comic artist who goes by Achiru.

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