Art of Nature: 50 Million Years

In increasingly disconnected times it is hard to see how we are all interconnected. Wars, religion and politics divide us more than at any moment in our history. And it is precisely when we move from the present, with its uncertainty, to the past that we can see how we are, all of us, interconnected. The famous American astronomer and planetary scientist Carl Sagan once said, "We are made of star stuff" a fitting statement as we seek to understand and explore our place in the universe. 

The objects we have lovingly curated are of unfathomable beauty and unfathomable magnitude. They are of aeons and ages long gone but are important traces of not only our shared history and origins but those of the universe and all that has existed prior to the moment you finish reading this very sentence.

A journey though our exhibition is a journey through time spanning 4.3 billion years.  These tangible objects come from distant worlds and distant ecosystems that beared such different lives to the ones that we know. Sculpted by nature, they are the cosmic forces that unite us.

The iridescence of ammonites is caused by ammolite, which contains a phenomenon called iridescence interference. This occurs when light waves are scattered and refracted by the microscopic structure of the shell material. The shell is made up of layers of aragonite, a mineral that has a unique crystal structure that reflects light. As light waves pass through these layers, they interfere with each other, creating a spectrum of colours that change depending on the angle of the light source and the observer.

The colours found in our specimens are cause by the combination of millions of years of compression and the mineralisation of iron, copper and silica which precipitated from volcanic ash. Ammolite is found primarily in the Rocky Mountains of North America, and it is only mined in a few locations in Canada. The gemstone is highly prized by collectors and jewellry designers for its striking beauty and unique patterns of colour.

The colours and patterns on the shell can help identify different species and provide clues about the environmental conditions in which they lived. Some researchers even use the iridescence of ammonites to study the evolution of colour and optical properties in animals.