A peek inside Weta’s Bug Lab
As Weta Workshop and Te Papa put the final touches on Bug Lab, designer Ben Barraud talks to about the inspiration behind the creepy-crawly exhibition.
What do brain surgery, mind control, super speed, zombies, and explosives have in common?
They are all topics that feature in Te Papa’s latest blockbuster exhibition, Bug Lab.
The exhibition takes a look at the secret superpowers of bugs – from a beetle which shoots an explosive concoction out its backside, to a wasp which can perform mind-controlling brain surgery on a cockroach so it can lay its eggs inside. From December 10, visitors to Te Papa will be able to enter the colourful, iridescent, hands-on space, marvel at monumental-sized bugs, and even help giant bees to ‘‘cook’’ an invasive hornet.
The exhibition is the second major collaboration between Te Papa’s head of design, Ben Barraud, and Weta Workshop’s Richard Taylor.
The duo and their teams are also responsible for the hugely successful exhibition Gallipoli: The Scale of our War.
The original concept was a superhero show, which would include how certain superheros’ powers were based on bugs.
Eventually the team decided that bugs were the superheros in their own right.
With interactive fireflies greeting guests into Bug Lab, the exhibition takes a unique look at the lives of some of the most extraordinary inhabitants on Earth, and how humans are learning from their genius ways.
‘‘For 450 million years, bugs have been getting smarter,’’ Taylor says. ’’From brain surgery to teamwork to mastering flight – they can really outdo us humans at most things!’’
The exhibition is based on four separate ‘‘chambers’’, each featuring one or more giant, jawdropping insects as they carry-out their superpower.
More than 40,000 hours of work went into creating the models, which included having to completely shave a real bee (including the hairs on its eyes) in order to get an accurate 3D scan.
When it then came to making the giant bees, each had to have thousands of individual pig hairs punched into them.
Barraud, set designer and second unit art director for The Hobbit, has once again merged exhibit design and filmmaking techniques, as he did for Gallipoli.
He isn’t aware of any other museums and film companies in the world teaming up in the same way Te Papa and Weta have, calling it a ‘‘happy accident’’.
‘‘My background and working with Richard clicked with the aspirations of the museum to become more cinematic and more visitor-focused, not just cabinets, curators and labels on walls.
‘‘Films are about a visitor experience and about creating an enchanting world for people to go into and forget themselves, and that’s the way I approach exhibition design.’’
Part of the experience includes a specially-designed score by composer Tane Upjohn-Beatson, who also wrote the music for Gallipoli.
Recorded by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, the music in different areas blends seamlessly, another technique taken from film which Barraud says he hasn’t seen in other exhibitions.
A younger target audience of about 7-12 was in mind while devising the exhibition, but Barraud says ‘‘big kids’’ will enjoy it too.
It’s the reason they made sure all visitors could go on the bombardier beetle slide, which simulates the gurgling, explosive concoction that the insect fires out its rear-end at ants.
As well as capturing imaginations through impressive insect models, the team made sure they got the science right by bringing on board the likes of ‘‘bug man’’ Ruud Kleinpaste and University of Canterbury spider scientist Simon Pollard.
Bug Lab also explains some of humankind’s best bio-inspired inventions, such as drones based on insect flight, life-saving medicine made from venom, foil strips on money, and new body parts printed from spider silk.
The stories of New Zealand insects also feature, including Weta – son of Punga, who is the God of Ugly Things, and how the Puriri moth’s larvae inspired the carvings of the Putorino flute.
Several custom crates have been created especially for the touring exhibition. Following its showing at Te Papa, Bug Lab will head to the Melbourne Museum, and continue on to the US and Asia.
Bug Lab opens on Saturday, December 10, and closes Monday, April 17, 2017.
Tickets are on sale now at Te Papa priced at $15 for adults and $5 for children, with concession and family packages also available.