Seldom Seen – Collection
Peil Island Visitor Centre
Art Gene’s associate artists, architects and other specialists including ecologists, archaeologists, industry representatives, naturalists and historians have been working with local people to uncover hidden assets, achievements and to reveal the superlatives associated with of the Islands of Barrow for a number of years. This collaborative process is perhaps best evidenced in the diversity of assembled artifacts and stories encapsulated within the Seldom Seen collection of curiosities.
The cabinet, designed by architect Charlie MacKeith, explores the island’s historic and present day achievements – from Britain’s first ridgid airship, seaplane flight and submarine, to the mass observation movement and nobel prize-winning research with seabirds through to present day nuclear submarine production and the largest off-shore wind farm in the world.
These achievements are set within a context featuring National Nature Reserves, conservation areas and RAMSAR sites supporting many rare species of flora and fauna from yellow-horned poppies and seals to natterjack toads, porpoise and basking sharks, bee orchids and the six spot burnet moths which populate the Islands of Barrow.
Jo Ray (pictured right) led on assembling the Seldom Seen Collection; a cabinet of curiosities. The pictures on this page show various tableaux exploring the character and history of the Islands of Barrow within the cabinet. Shown here whilst exhibited in the Seldom Seen Exhibition at Art Gene before being permanently installed in the Ship Inn, Piel Island, Barrow-in-Furness.
The cabinet features a number of assemblages created by our collaborative team of associates with and alongside items on loan or donated by islanders, the wider Barrow community and visitors to the Islands of Barrow.