Sprigg Salon Conversations: Illustrating the Palaeozoic with Peter Trusler

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How do artists accurately depict ancient life? Is it just a guess or is there method in the making? 

Join South Australian Museum and Adelaide University palaeontologist Associate Professor Diego Garcia-Bellido and renowned scientific Illustrator Peter Trusler as they discuss the process of bringing extinct creatures back to life through scientific illustration and artistic research. 

Working directly with researchers at museums and universities worldwide, Peter Trusler is the trusted artist behind many iconic images of extinct fauna, including a plethora of books, papers, and four previously released Australian prehistoric stamp panoramas. His artwork invites inquiry, engaging the viewer and transporting them back millions of years to the time where insects ruled or megafauna roamed the continent.  

Hear about the process of bringing a 2-dimensional shape into 3D and creating lifelike images of prehistoric life with immersive details contextualising a vast array of interconnected relationships between the environment and its inhabitants. Peter's latest published work, depicting reconstructions of the Palaeozoic fossils from the Emu Bay Shale of Kangaroo Island, will also be on display in the Main Foyer of the Museum.   

Your ticket includes a welcome drink on arrival.

The evening's schedule:

5:00- (Doors open for educators attending the Teacher Professional Development session)

6:00- Door open for all other ticket holders and welcome drinks served

6:30- Presentation starts in the Pacific Cultures Gallery, Mezzanine Level

7:15- Q&A with Peter Trusler and Diego Garcia-Bellido

7:30- Presentation concludes

8:00- Doors close

About the Presenters

Peter Trusler

Dr. Peter Trusler is a multi-award winning Melbourne freelance artist and is a Zoological science graduate from Monash University obtaining his PhD. from Monash in 2016. He holds a special interest in biological illustration, although his illustrative projects have encompassed diverse disciplines such as geology, palaeontology, anatomy, ornithology, ecology, psychology, medicine and related educational subjects. His illustrations are highly regarded internationally and feature in numerous popular and scientific publications.

A/Prof Diego C. Garcia-Bellido

Diego was born, raised and graduated in Spain, where he got his BSc in Zoology (1997) and PhD in Palaeontology (2002) from the Complutense University in Madrid. Diego settled in Australia in 2012 but has previously carried out long research stays in Los Angeles, Toronto, Cambridge and London. He studies the early evolution of animals during the Ediacaran and Cambrian, more than half a billion years ago, particularly in the Flinders Ranges and Kangaroo Island, but also the Canadian Rockies, the Andes and the Atlas. His expertise focuses on exceptional preservation of trilobites and other arthropods, molluscs, echinoderms, worms, sponges and non-mineralised chordates. He has has published widely on fossils from Australia, Canada, Spain, Portugal, Morocco, China, Argentina and Peru. 

The Sprigg Salon Series is generously supported by Beach Energy. 

Image Credit: Peter Trusler