The Maier’s student docent club, FRAME (an acronym for Future Restorationists, artists, and Museum Enthusiasts) annually selects a faculty member to deliver a lecture at the Museum addressing aspects of the visual arts from the perspective of their discipline. The third annual FRAMEworthy Faculty Lecture will be presented by Douglas Shedd, The Catherine Ehrman Thoresen ’23 and William E. Thoresen Professor of Biology.

FRAME chose Professor Shedd for a variety of reasons, one being his strong identification with major themes in the 98th Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Art—Evolutionary Drift: Works by Sue Johnson and Pam Longobardi. Professor Shedd states, “I became a biologist because I’m interested in why the world is the way it is, and the areas in which I specialize—behavior, ecology, and evolution—provide lots of answers.”

One of Professor Shedd’s research projects includes studying a rare species of bird ecologically linked to the traditional agricultural practices still in evidence along parts of Ireland’s west coast. Visual artists Johnson and Longobardi are also deeply interested in bird species (real and imagined) and how ecology is informed by human presence and practice.