The University of Melbourne’s Potter Museum of Art has opened A velvet ant, a flower and a bird, a new exhibition challenging how we define intelligence across art, science and the natural world.
Rather than framing intelligence as purely human or artificial, the show asks visitors to consider it as something shared across living systems and even materials. It blurs the line between the natural and the artificial, turning the gallery into something closer to an ecosystem than a white cube.
Curated by Professor Chus Martínez, Head of the Institute of Art Gender Nature at the Basel Academy of Art and Design, the exhibition is structured around three figures from nature: a velvet ant, a flower and a bird.
“Collections hold many narratives — historical, cultural, economic and material — and by bringing them into living knowledge systems, we dissolve the binary between the natural and the artificial. The visitor enters a kind of ecosystem, where objects and digital media exist without hierarchy, allowing the imagination to roam widely,” Professor Martínez said.
“This exhibition explores how cognition extends beyond humans,” he said.
“It is structured around three familiar figures from nature – a velvet ant, a flower and a bird. These figures carry symbolic and metaphorical weight that encourage us to reimagine what intelligence really means.”
Drawing on historic and contemporary works from the University’s collection and beyond, the exhibition brings together artists from Australia, Argentina, Denmark, Germany, India, New Zealand and further afield, creating a space where disciplines overlap and new connections begin.
A velvet ant, a flower and a bird is open until 6 June 2026 at the Potter Museum of Art.
