The photographic series Museum of Silence expresses my concern for endangered animal species.

Through our relatively short history of development, Australians have become one of the most highly urbanised populations on earth.  We live on the edge of a continent whose landscape has been radically altered and many of its natural systems have been destroyed or polluted.

From within our urban settlements we now relate to and experience nature at an ever increasing degree of distance and abstraction. We experience wildlife through photographs, the wildlife documentary or in Museums and Zoos. The natural environment in these contexts has been ordered and tamed.

My images have come out of a collection of preserved native animals in the Australian Museum in Sydney. The way in which animals are presented evokes a sense of the spiritual distance that separates us from our fellow species in the present day.  They are long dead and dust covered, locked away in glass cabinets and stored in a monumental building deep within the city.

Taxidermy is used as a metaphor for our lack of awareness of the needs of our fellow species.  It is possible to draw similarities between taxidermy and photography, for instance both strive to achieve some semblance of life.  If we continue to put other species at risk the earth will suffer a great loss.  We cannot expect these records to last eternally, they too will fade with time.