Sculptures Made From Honeycombs by Aganetha Dyck

Aganetha Dyck is a Canadian artist from Manitoba who takes ordinary objects such as shoes, buttons and figurines and turns them into exotic, delicate and sometime humorous art. In the following series, Dyck covered figurines with honeycombs and beework to reveal the intricacies of communication that exist between the two species.

Aganetha Dyck begins by choosing a slightly broken object or damaged material from a second hand market place. Dyck always picks damaged objects because, according to her, “honeybees are meticulous beings, they continuously mend anything around them and they do pay attention to detail.” To encourage the honeybees to communicate, Dyck strategically adds wax or honey, propolis or hand-made honeycomb patterns to the objects prior to placing them into their hives. After the bees start building honeycombs over the object, Dyck would coax them into specific shapes by adding or deleting wax.

Aganetha Dyck works under the direction of a beekeeper and all her works are supervised by scientists.

In an interview to Mason Journal, Aganetha Dyck said:

“Honeybee communication research continues throughout the scientific and beekeeping world. Scientists and beekeepers, as well as dozens of international artists, plus a growing number of global citizens, are increasingly concerned with the health of honeybees. Communication between species is urgent. Research continues to try and prevent honeybees from disappearing from our world. The reason for the concern of disappearing honeybees is mainly due to the honeybees ability to pollinate over 40% of the world’s food supply.”