Contrivances is a timeline of images inspired by Darwin’s book-with-the-long-name about orchid pollination: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing.

Each painting in the series suggests gradually shifting environments, and small drawings of Darwin’s orchids and their pollinators are interspersed along the timeline. The drawings were copied using blind contour to introduce random errors, and those imperfect copies were in turn copied, so that the series of images are subject to entropy… but displayed in reverse, they suggest increasing order and organization. There are wide gaps between series, mirroring the wide gaps in the fossil record.