(Art) Histories of the Museum Fauna 〰 Resistance within Lund University Art Collection is a series of text- and sound-based artworks installed alongside selected artworks from the collections of Skissernas Museum and Lund University where non-human animals are portrayed. The text- and sound works corresponds to, and offer, alternative (art) histories told from the perspectives of the visible and invisible animals on display. A horse tells of physical labour and the violence of their master. A fish remembers being turned into glue. A butterfly recalls being treated as lifeless material.
The installation is part of a larger solo exhibition at Skissernas Museum titled The Museum Fauna – Lost Tails and Unheard Stories of Resistance developed through a two-year research process in the museum and university’s collections. More than 40,000 paintings, sketches and models were examined—first digitally, then in physical archives, storages, offices and exhibition halls. The project draws on methods from critical animal studies and artistic research to explore how animals, both visible and invisible, are embedded within art history and art production.
The concept of Museum Fauna, developed in the thesis Resistance Within the Museum Fauna – Challenging Anthropocentrism through Counter Art Histories and Non-Human Narratives, is used to describe the presence of visible and invisible non-human animals within the museum walls, those portrayed and those whose bodies were once ground into pigment, varnish, and glue and no longer can be seen. The aim of the project is to question the human-centeredness of art history and invite to reflect on how power, representation, and materiality intersect in the asymmetrical power relation between artist and non-human animal.
This project was shown together with The Animal Lover and Archive of Lost Tails at Skissernas Museum from June to November 2025 in the exhibition The Museum Fauna – Lost Tails and Unheard Stories of Resistance.
More information about, and excerpts from, the text- and sound-based artworks will soon be available on this page.
