Last chance: Victorian science meets art in Manchester Museum’s Object Lessons

The boundaries between art and science are being explored in a new exhibition at Manchester Museum. Beginning in May, Object Lessons showcases artifacts that were used to teach science in the 19th century. Visitors can expect to see plenty of taxidermy, and items that helped demonstrate the natural world as it was understood at the time. The 200 pieces presented in the exhibition were part of a private collection belonging to George Loudon. Loudon was a collector of contemporary art, but after a trip to a natural history museum, he saw these Victorian scientific artificers as works of art in their own right. Standouts include life-size anatomical models of a wild animals, an exploded skull, and a model used to show the bite of a rattlesnake. It’s not all so macabre; there’s also imagery, including lithographs of the Grand Canyon, and some of the first illustrations of the Aurora Borealis.

Fri 19 May – Sun 20 Aug, Manchester Museum, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL, Tel: 0161 275 2648, FREE, www.museum.manchester.ac.uk