HeatherÕs exhibition captures the magic of winged creatures

Date Published: 20-Jun-2012

Western Wings, a photographic exhibition on butterflies and moths currently running in Connemara National Park, Letterfrack should appeal to lovers of art photography and naturalists alike.

These striking images of butterflies and moths that frequent Connemara are the work of locally based photographer Heather Greer, who is well known in the area for her stunning photographs of Connemara landscapes and seascapes.

The retired energy consultant, who is originally from Howth, has been living in Cleggan since 2006 but her relationship with North Connemara’s Aughrus Peninsula goes back much further than that. She’d been visiting there for decades with friends and in 2000 she bought a house there.

“I found myself spending more time here and in 2006 I moved down.”

Western Wings, which consists of 80 pictures, has been about 12 years in the making. She has many more photos, she explains, but the size of the exhibition area meant that she couldn’t show them all.

Heather is passionate about moths believes they deserve much better treatment than the whack of a rolled-up newspaper!

“You might think of butterflies as bright and colourful, while moths are brown and dull. As this exhibition shows, many moths in fact are highly coloured and beautiful; they deserve to be looked at and admired!”

Moths display a wide variety of clever markings and colourings designed to fool predators, she explains. These including the use of disguise (looking like their food plants); cryptic patterns which camouflage them in the dappled light and shade among plants; and markings which spell out danger (such as bright red underwings), or which look like animals’ eyes or faces.

Heather’s photographs include fine examples of these fascinating markings and she has also included information such as food plants, wingspans, and flight seasons.

“I want it to be educational and nice to look at and it’s a really appropriate exhibition for the National Park.”

She points out that butterflies employ similar patterns of markings to aid survival. But because they are creatures of daylight, while most moths fly in dusk or in darkness, butterflies are often regarded as brighter – more ‘beautiful’, more ‘friendly’.

In reality, she adds, moths are frequently as colourful and bright as their butterfly cousins. She advises people to “take a hard look at the silhouettes of moths resting on the outside of your window, on a summer’s night when the room light is on and the night is dark outside, and you’ll be captivated by the variety and loveliness of what you see”.

The Western Wings exhibition consists mostly of moths. But there are also photographic images of butterflies and some of the larvae of both. In addition, for comparison purposes, she has also included, some images of larvae of other insects such as ladybirds and sawflies, often not assumed by the lay person to have a larval stage at all.

“The subjects here are by no means rare or uncommon to see,” says Heather of the show. “Rather, they are all around us; it’s just that many of us just don’t notice that they’re there. What I would like to achieve through this exhibition is a raised awareness of both the beauty and the ecological value of butterflies and especially of moths.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.