Opening February 28: Leann Janzekovich, The Honeysuckle: a Fusion of Art and Science

The purpose of my exhibition is to fuse art and science through biological illustration in order to communicate science to the public. In particular, botanical knowledge and communication is severely lacking in the average person. In fact, it is so bad that this phenomenon was labeled as Plant Awareness Disparity and defined as “the idea that people tend not to notice or appreciate the plants in their environment” rather seeing the world through a human or animal centric perspective and seeing plants as inferior (NIH.gov, 2023). To break this cycle, the goal of my project is to combine my scientific research with art to communicate and educate the average person on the amazing evolution of Lonicera. With my current artwork I aim to communicate real world research on the floral evolution of honeysuckles to non-scientists in a way that is approachable, objective, yet creative and interesting to the public. While appealing to the general public may seem to be a very broad challenge, it is the individual who walks into my exhibit that I am inviting to become curious about science through an expression of my artistic communication.