In his works for the Echo series, an exhibition and accompanying book, Finnish photographer Perttu Saksa takes us deeper into his recurrent themes of nature and culture, and the relationship and intersections of these two systems. This series of photographs explores taxidermy, monkeys and other primates, dating from colonial times, taken in the archives of museums of natural history in different cities around Europe, including Copenhagen, Brussels, Berlin and Stockholm.
“I’m especially fascinated by natural history collections that date back to times when people’s conceptions of animals weren’t yet shaped by photography and nature films. In those times, when natural sciences were still in their early stages of development and people’s knowledge of nature was scarce, taxidermists projected their own hopes and fears related to distant countries and exotic animals onto the specimens they were working on,” Saksa explains.
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