Hidden Ubiquity: Celebrating the tiny majority

We are a wondrous, accomplished, creative species of primate… that also happens to be shortsighted, dangerously self-absorbed, and destructive on a global scale. The only planet we know to harbor life is changing rapidly, largely by our industrious actions. Never before has the need to explore, embrace, and conserve life’s diversity been as important as it is now.

This show represents hints of what we cannot see, or often choose not to see, and is a plea to celebrate the tiny majority that drives our ecosystems and has influenced human culture since our cultures’ incipient stages. There are more than one million described species of insects and they are vanishing at a rate that some liken to an armageddon. The evolutionary legacies, the ecological functions, the esthetics, the cultural history, and the potential to influence humans should be enough to make us cherish and protect our tiny irreplaceable neighbors.

Barrett Klein is an associate professor of entomology and animal behavior, investigating sleep in societies of insects at the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse.  He studied entomology at Cornell University and the University of Arizona, and Ecology, Evolution & Behavior at the University of Texas at Austin, although this academic sequence was split by years of producing natural history exhibits for museums.  Klein worked at Chase Studio Inc. (MO), then at the American Museum of Natural History (NY), roaming its half-lit halls by night and creating insects, giant viruses, and working in both education and exhibition by day.

https://www.uwlax.edu/profile/bklein/

http://www.pupating.org/