VISITORS will be able to delve into the world of birds by exploring avian symbolism in art and trace its significance across cultures and time in a groundbreaking exhibition at The Bowes Museum next year.

Murmuration presents a wide selection of work from artists and makers from various generations, backgrounds and genres whose work ranges from drawing, sculpture, film and installation.

Visitors to the County Durham museum will discover the pivotal role that birds play as indicators to the health of the environment, reflecting the urgent climate crisis and, through the work of artists and makers, ponder the metaphor of birds as messengers of home and belonging as well as learn how birds were represented in art as metaphors for innocence, status and courtship through artworks from the collection.

They can examine the complex reasons around the collecting of taxidermy, from its role as a teaching resource to its connections to scientific racism and colonial exploitation, and consider the ethical and cultural implications of preserving animals for study and display.

Featuring a mix of contemporary and historical works in a series of themes around belonging, collection, crisis and symbolism, the show includes works by Larry Achiampong and David Blandy, Henna Asikainen, Shiraz Bayjoo, Bentley Beetham, museum founder Joséphine Bowes, Michel Pierre Hubert Descours, John Doyle, Ryan Gander, Sally Madge, Bethan Maddocks, Edouard-Aimé Pils, David Shrigley, C F Tunnicliffe and Hanna Tuulikki.

Murmuration will raise awareness of our human impact on the environment and promote concern for the need for individual and collective change towards a more sustainable, equitable and ecological future on a shared and increasingly fragile planet.

Regional artist, Bethan Maddocks’ paper sculptural-installation, Twelfth Night Pie recreates a bird pie filled with species that now face mass decline, this will be juxtaposed with the Irish artist John Doyle’s lithograph print from 1936, Sing a Song of Sixpence from the collection.

There is an exhibition of photographic images by the Barnard Castle-based ornithologist, photographer and adventurer Bentley Betham, and a series of contemporary taxidermy pieces by the late Sunderland multidisciplinary artist Sally Madge, which show the consequences consuming microplastics has on on birds.

The show will also feature a sound piece by Hanna Tuulikki that invites visitors to immerse themselves in a cacophony of bird song and calls, as well as a film work by Larry Achiampong and David Blandy.

This film explores the under-recognised relationship between Charles Darwin and John Edmonstone, a former enslaved black man, whose teaching gave Darwin taxidermy skills that were pivotal to the development of his theory of evolution.

Vicky Sturrs, The Bowes Museum’s Director of Programmes and Collections, said: “This is a timely exhibition that showcases the museum’s vast and varied collection, exhibiting a number of previously unseen works from our stores alongside contemporary pieces that, together, explore our human impact in and on the natural world.

"We have some stunning pieces on show from artists, designers and makers that, although centuries apart, speak to similar ideas; documenting and commenting on our impact on the planet. This show will, through a host of visual treats, promote thinking and action for us as individuals and as humankind, to slow the decline of climate change.”

Murmuration is at The Bowes Museum, from January 27 to June 23.

For more details, see www.thebowesmuseum.org.uk/support.