Shell Spiral 

Scott Fraser created this work, 'Shell Spiral', using oil paint. Its concern with order and taxonomy prompts us to ask what is at stake when humans try to classify the natural world? Fraser, working in the late 20th and early 21st century, inherited a specific set of post-Enlightenment scientific values. During the Enlightenment, the study of natural history became a popular, even a fashionable pursuit, but it was also a means of asserting control over the world, a way of naming and ordering things according to rational principles. In that context, the depiction of shells, carefully arranged, could be seen as an assertion of human mastery. Historians have studied the ways in which scientific institutions like museums and universities have shaped our understanding of nature, which suggests that these images are never neutral. By examining the cultural and historical context in which this painting was made, we can better understand its meaning and significance.