Anna Dumitriu Blog

27th January 2020

“Burden” (2017) is a hand carved sculptural work which focusses on the global health crisis of tuberculosis and is part of Anna Dumitriu’s Romantic Disease series. Made with carved Zimbabwean lemon opal stone and fruit stone, embroidered calico dyed with madder root (used as an ancient treatment for TB), and impregnated with TB DNA. Tuberculosis […]

27th January 2020

“Rest, Rest, Rest!” (2014) takes the form of a tiny altered antique toy hospital bed and screen which are impregnated with the extracted tuberculosis (TB) DNA and dyed with natural dyes, which were historically used as treatments for the disease. It is part of Anna Dumitriu’s Romantic Disease series. Until the discovery of the antibiotic […]

27th January 2020

“The Consultation” (2014) reflects on the hopes of patients in their treatments at the very start of the antibiotic age and the increasing contemporary challenge of antibiotic resistance. These altered doll-sized modernist chairs and table have been stained orange with Prontosil, a sulfa medicine created in 1932 and based on Dr Paul Ehrlich’s concept of […]

27th January 2020

Anna Dumitriu worked with scientists Melissa Grant and Rachel Sammons at the University of Birmingham to create “Microbe Mouth” (2016) made from unique teeth grown using bacteria. The team literally grew teeth, or at least the hydroxyapatite that tooth enamel is made from, in the lab using an extremophile bacterium which is part of the species […]

24th January 2020

Anna Dumitriu’s “Normal Flora” project began in 2004 as a pioneering artistic project created in collaboration with microbiologist Professor John Paul. It significantly pre-dates contemporary popular research into what has become known as “the microbiome”, a field made possible through developments in new technologies in genomics. When the project began this area of microbiological study […]

4th February 2019

Clouds have their own microbiomes, made up of bacteria, viruses and fungal spores, which have been swept up from the ground by wind and through evaporation, in order to hitch rides around the planet. Water vapour can collect on these tiny specks of organic matter and seed ice crystals which fall as snow, their intricate […]

4th February 2020

This project is artistically explored the “Collateral Effects” of the pandemic on science and society through the creation of a body of art works stemming from in-depth collaborations with researchers from leading scientific organisations across England. The immediate impacts of the pandemic are clear but there are already many unforeseen collateral effects on science as […]