The Collaboration Between Art History and Genetics – An Unlikely Marriage of Disciplines

Abstract

Our fruits, vegetables, and cereal crops stem from a wild ancestor and have undergone major changes through millennia of domestication and selection. There are various ways to reveal plant diversity over time, and one of these is through the combination of art history and genetics (also known as #ArtGenetics). Here, we discuss this approach from the art historian’s point of view and flag the advantages and caveats of such an approach. We also advocate for the development of an integrated, global art database to facilitate such analyses.

Tracing the introduction history of the tulip that went wild (Tulipa sylvestris) in sixteenth-century Europe

“…We suggest that a combination of botanical and historical research is necessary in order to understand the complex origin and taxonomic status of naturalized plants that have a past of introduction. Recent studies point in the same direction 119 – 122 . Large-scale initiatives of the last decades to digitize historical archives, books and herbaria, and make them publicly available online pave the way for such interdisciplinary studies 85 , 121 , 123 .…”

“…Large-scale initiatives of the last decades to digitize historical archives, books and herbaria, and make them publicly available online pave the way for such interdisciplinary studies 85 , 121 , 123 . Establishing global open-access databases with more historic material can provide new tools for research in botanical history 122 . Physical access to the original material remains essential for observing details, as conducted herein for example to verify the taxonomic identification of Aldrovandi’s ca.…”

The role of pre-19th century art in conservation biology: An untapped potential for connecting with nature

“…Pre-19 th art is generally characterized as being a testimony to past civilizations (Gombrich, 2011); it thus seems logical that scientists today are interested in these artworks in the attempt to better understand our historical connections with nature and the environmental history of living organisms. Researchers have, for example, investigated representations of fruits, flowers, vegetables or cereals in historical art in order to trace evolutionary history regarding selections over time (see for example Benzi and Berliocchi, 1999;De Smet and Vergauwen, 2021;Kazemi-Shahandashti et al, 2022). This kind of initiative, that examines botanical material from art historical sources, requires the close collaboration of biologists and art historians.…”