The Art of Science

Have you ever seen embroidery and quilting used as a teaching aid for astronomy?

In 1876, Ellen Harding Baker, made this quilt to use in her lectures on astronomy in Iowa and it is now in the Smithsonian's National Quilt Collection.

Thanks to the link from a reader in South Africa (thank you, Fiona) which is to a mymodernmet article, further digging revealed not only the quilt on this interesting website which is about science and art but much more. I love this work which uses bees to make a serious point about the decline of honeybees in a really rather beautiful way.