14 May–20 Nov: ‘Darwin & Maastricht’ exhibition

‘Darwin & Maastricht’ exhibition

14 May – 20 November 2009
Maastricht University administration building
Minderbroedersberg 4-6

Nearly every year the University Library and the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASoS) organise an exhibition on a science-related topic. This is usually done using books from the Jesuit collection. From 2009 onwards these activities will be organised by the university’s Arts and Heritage Committee (KEC).

In the Darwin & Maastricht exhibition, guest curator and FASoS academic staff member Ludo Hellemans shows the relationship between Maastricht, Maastricht University and evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin. The new temporary exhibition is on display in Maastricht University’s administration building from 14 May to 20 November 2009.

How is Maastricht related to Darwin and evolutionary theory?

In more ways than you would think! Consider the 19th century Maastricht pharmacist Joseph de Bosquet. De Bosquet was a commendable amateur palaeontologist who regularly exchanged fossil data with Darwin – Darwin even mentioned one of De Bosquet’s discoveries in his 1859 book on evolutionary theory, On the Origin of Species. Sadly, De Bosquet later acknowledged that he had been mistaken: what he had taken for an old fossil (of a sessile cirriped) wasn’t as old as he thought.

Another link between South-Limburg and Darwin was laid by catholic Jesuit Father Erich Wasmann, born in 1859, the year in which Darwin’s evolutionary theories were published. Wasmann was a biologist who specialised in ants. He accepted the evolutionary theory, insofar as it aided in his biologic research – but he refused to accept that it also applied to humans. Homo sapiens, he believed, could have been created only by God.

Eijsden-born Eugène Dubois, who became internationally famous for his discovery of the Pithecanthropus erectus or ‘Java man’ in 1893, is the founder of palaeo-anthropology. It was a find that captured the popular imagination: King Kong and Tarzan the apeman owe their names to Dubois’s discovery.

The theory of evolution still plays an important part in teaching and research at Maastricht University, and not only in the science sector. Evolutionary concepts can be used to understand economic processes, while modern arts and culture practitioners apply evolutionary biology in music, dance, literature, painting and beauty/aesthetics. A video specially compiled for this exhibition gives an insight into the modern significance of Darwin in Maastricht University.

Source: Maastricht University

Related article: Photo-reportage: Darwin & Maastricht exhibition at Maastricht University (until 20 November 2009)