'Labelled' by Dail Behennah

28 February 2009 to late April 2010

This contemporary art commission, is supported by The Arts Council and Museums, Libraries and Archives (MLA) South West's New Expressions - a major new programme from the regional agency for museums, libraries and archives, which is enabling museums such as us to work with leading artists.

Dail Behennah’s work 'Labelled' is now on display in the mezzanine window of the museum. The work comprises 490 suspended labels, each made of enamel printed with a label from natural history specimens belonging to the museum. The labels hang in three layers forming a circle that is 2m 25cm/88½" diameter. The circle is punctuated by red enamel labels indicating endangered or extinct species.

Behennah's work draws attention to the museum's collections and their associated information, asking questions about why we collect and what we can learn from museums. It also makes a statement about the ecology and diversity looking at the fragility of the natural world as highlighted by the red labels.

Dail Behennah is currently based in Bristol but was born and grew up in Plymouth. 'Labelled' is her first large scale piece in enamel. Her work has been exhibited throughout the UK as well as in the USA and Japan including major commissions for Castle Park and Harbourside in Bristol and Taunton and Somerset Hospital

Find out more about how she made the enamel labels by reading our project leaflet below. Example labels are available for handling in the museum and a film of Behennah making and installing the work can be seen on one of the display screens in our foyer.

Documents

To view these documents you might need to download some software. Visit our downloads page for more information.

	'Looking in - Looking out' project leaflet - find out more about this project, including the steps taken from creation of the enamel labels, to installation of 'Labelled'. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 765.5KB
	Artist's statement for 'Labelled' - read about the ideas behind Dail Behennah's installation. File format Adobe Acrobat (pdf) - 14.2KB

[Back to top]