rolled lunge-feeding blue whale,
perth, Western Australia
In 1897, a deceased 24m blue whale washed ashore just north of Busselton in Western Australia. It took over 3 years for Otto Lipfert, a dedicated taxidermist from the newly formed Western Australia Museum, with the help of a farmer and some fishermen, to deflesh, move the bones by horse and cart and allow them to bleach in the sun. The skeleton was mounted and exhibited in two different locations over the next several decades until it was taken down in 2003 and put in storage as the museum was to be redeveloped. In 2018, Cetacea advised on all aspects of the project to get this skeleton back on display, including bone preparation. We then took on the exciting project to design, fabricate and fit a bespoke external cradling steel armature and suspension system to hang this 123 year old skeleton in downtown Perth's historic library building, Hackett Hall, part of the New Museum redevelopment. The museum has reopened to the public - check out this 2.5 minute virtual tour.
This was our first fully 3D scanned and modelled exhibit. For this project we teamed up with the amazing staff at the WAM, Camosun College's Technology Access Centre, and the design, engineering and fabrication team at CADDS Group in Australia. It was a stellar collaboration.
This was our first fully 3D scanned and modelled exhibit. For this project we teamed up with the amazing staff at the WAM, Camosun College's Technology Access Centre, and the design, engineering and fabrication team at CADDS Group in Australia. It was a stellar collaboration.
Photos from left (courtesy of the Western Australia Museum): Skeleton on display in the 1950s; Photo taken in 1980s; Skeleton in storage from 2003-2019.
The skeleton has been carefully engineered and suspended as though powerfully thrusting its body and turning into a downward rolling lunge. With its jaws closing, you can imagine it has just engulfed a patch of krill, about to close its jaws and push the huge volume of seawater out through its mouth with its elephant-sized tongue before swallowing the prey trapped in its baleen. This posture was inspired by the latest knowledge of underwater blue whale dynamics using tagging research. It is the largest skeleton in the world to be displayed in this way.
During the installation phase, we had the privelege to collaborate with a highly acclaimed photographer videographer and cinematographer, Michael Haluwena of Aeroture. Check out his creative time-lapse of the skeleton installation and this awesome drone flythrough around the whale skeleton.
Installation timelapse
Drone flythrough of the completed installation
Header photo by Michael Haluwena of Aeroture
