Skip to main content
Customizable
On the Appreciation of Species | Wall Sculpture in Wall Hangings by Ansen Seale. Item made of wood
Satisfaction Guarantee
Customize this piece
On the Appreciation of Species | Wall Sculpture in Wall Hangings by Ansen Seale. Item made of wood
On the Appreciation of Species | Wall Sculpture in Wall Hangings by Ansen Seale. Item made of wood
On the Appreciation of Species | Wall Sculpture in Wall Hangings by Ansen Seale. Item made of wood

Created and Sold by Ansen Seale

Ansen Seale

On the Appreciation of Species - Wall Hangings

$ On Inquiry

This work is a celebration of the diversity of species on the planet and an acknowledgement of their dwindling numbers. It’s a reminder that our own fate is tightly linked with those species that remain. Twenty-three circles made from wood veneer rotate as an interactive vertical mobile on the wall of a Wisconsin life sciences company.
Whether you're religious or not, the book of Genesis posits that humans have dominion over creation, and this idea is surely embedded in our culture and psyche. Just in the 20th century, humans have come to the sudden realization that dominion comes with responsibility. We’ve realized that we can alter the planet in such a way as to endanger those plants and animals we’ve been entrusted to protect.
Even if you don’t believe in this “stewardship” model of our role on the planet, the fact remains that we are better off with more species rather than fewer. Even in purely selfish terms, species diversity requires no altruistic motive, only the acceptance that our own survival depends on the widest diversity of other species on the planet.

Item On the Appreciation of Species
Created by Ansen Seale
As seen in Private Residence, Madison, WI
Have more questions about this item?
Ansen Seale
Meet the Creator
Wescover creator since 2018
Time and Motion

Ansen Seale's time-based works of photographic and sculptural art have been exhibited in museums and galleries internationally and have been collected by corporate, institutional and private collectors. In 2009, he received the Bernard Lifshutz Award in the Visual Arts from the Artist Foundation of San Antonio and his work is in the permanent collection of the San Antonio Museum of Art, The Harry Ransom Center at The University of Texas, Austin and The Museum of Contemporary Art, Salta, Argentina.

Seale works with a special digital camera of his own invention. This camera has the ability to capture a vertical slice of the scene over and over in rapid succession, in effect, swapping the horizontal dimension of the photo for the dimension of time. Instead of mirroring the world as we know it, this camera records a hidden reality. The apparent “distortions” in the images all happen in-camera as the image is being recorded.