Meet Ian Hart, Senior Exhibitor Preparator

Growing up, Ian always loved drawing and doodling, especially cartoons and people. He discovered how his interests in art and science could overlap while he was at university. One class in particular emphasized the connection between art and science: Ian’s vertebrate zoology course required students to keep detailed sketches of their dissections in lab notebooks, and they practiced sketching specimens as a way of communicating information. Ian’s professor was so impressed with his sketching skills that he hired Ian to do fish jaw sketches in his lab, which marked the beginning of Ian’s career combining art and science. In fact, if you search Wikipedia for “fish jaw,” the first drawing in the article is Ian’s sketch of a Cichlid fish!

_{Image credit: Gareth J Fraser C. Darrin Hulsey Ryan F Bloomquist Kristine Uyesugi Nancy R Manley J. Todd Streelman doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1000031.g001, Toothed Oral and Pharyngeal Jaws (crop), CC BY-SA 3.0}

After illustrating fish jaws, Ian went on to work as a freelance illustrator for research scientists and natural history museums, which eventually led him into his role at the Academy. Ian has loved the transition from doing two-dimensional sketches earlier in his career to the three-dimensional work that making exhibits requires.

Ian describes his preparator colleagues in the Exhibits Department as “exhibit fabricators”: they install and move exhibits, maintain existing exhibits, create specimen mounts, and more. His favorite projects are around natural history art, which let him use his background in biology to create anatomically accurate sketches and models of specimens. During his time at the Academy, Ian has worked on projects ranging from a canopy diorama in Color of Life, to the termite mounds and their digital effects in the African Hall, to fixing and mounting the tortoise and many other specimens in Hidden Wonders. Ian and the Exhibits Department also helped with the repair and assembly of The World’s Largest Dinosaurs exhibit. Fun fact: Ian was part of the team that created the original Mamenchisaurus when he worked at the American Museum of Natural History in New York!

One of Ian’s current diorama projects is working with a bobcat that will eventually be displayed in the Naturalist Center. The project involves repairing the specimen’s fur, helping the bobcat stand up in the display, and creating a background where a bobcat might actually be seen. Ian uses observations from iNaturalist to figure out potential surfaces for the diorama, then experiments with different materials to create a lighter weight version of the substrate.

Ian would love the creation of exhibits to involve a large range of roles, and the process of exhibit development to become more community-oriented. Ian’s hope is that artists, scientists, teachers, students, and community members who might not otherwise visit could come together at the Academy to learn about the range of ideas and perspectives that go into making exhibits.

Ian has taught workshops about making political props, and helped Academy staff and volunteers make March for Science posters in 2017. Some day, he hopes that there are open classes for the public to come use the tools of tangible model making to explore science and nature, and to learn some of the techniques that the Exhibits Department uses in their work.

He is passionate about the overlap of science and art, and about sharing that with the community. “They are both the representation of something, even though the purpose is sometimes different,” Ian says.

Academy anniversary: 2011

What does Ian like to do outside of work? Cooking (he recently brought his signature cannellini bean soup to the May Day potluck) and pulling weeds in his garden

Favorite animal outside the Academy: The bees he sees in the poppies in his garden

Favorite part of his job: Natural history art (what Ian calls “descriptive drawing,” which is drawing what you see in nature, in order to communicate information)

First job: A breakfast cook (at Delta of Venus Coffee House and Pub, which still exists in Davis, California)

Larissa Walder is senior associate of teacher professional development in the Academy's Education Department.