EXHIBITION FLYING DRAGONS

HUNTING IN INSECTS WORLD

The frail damselflies made their way through the grass, the broad-bodied chasers kept coming back to land on the same perch, the skimmers mated in flight, the darters played with the sun’s reflections on the surface of the water, the damselflies formed perfectly symmetrical designs with their wings and the powerful emperor dragonflies dominated their territory by moving around at lightning speed! The miniature world of dragonflies is one of diversity. Their flight characteristics are perfectly adapted to their living environment. Damselflies have a slow, hesitant flight pattern that conceals sudden, unpredictable changes of direction. The hawkers and emperors are incredibly lively, which turns photographing their flight into “mission impossible”!

The human eye is incapable of seeing the wonders that nature has created in turning dragonflies into real aerial acrobats. We are totally unable to see their synchronised wing-beats as they’re simply too fast. Similarly, we are unable to see how an emperor twists its front wings to perform a tight turn and change direction almost instantaneously.

The wide variety of body shapes in dragonflies means that there are considerable variations in flight behaviour. There is no possible comparison between the hesitant flight of a young damselfly that doesn’t appear to know where it’s going and the powerful, purposeful wing-beats of the blue hawker, which follows a constantly identical circuit, like a metronome, above the pond. These flight behaviours have guided the choice of prints for the exhibition Flying dragons.