A little cuckoo? Scots art college hires bird expert for job 8,000 miles away …

Published on Wednesday 3 March 2010 19:31

IT must rank as one of the most eccentric academic appointments ever made by any of Scotland's art colleges.

• Professor Tony Martin

Dundee's Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design yesterday announced that it had recruited one of the world's leading marine scientists to its professorial team.

The college then revealed that Professor Tony Martin will spend the next four years at the other side of the globe, working in one of the world's most remote locations, helping to protect threatened seabird colonies on the tiny Atlantic island of South Georgia.

Prof Martin will take up his post at the college, which is part of Dundee University, next month and be seconded to the South Georgia Heritage Trust (SGHT), which is also based in Dundee.

But he will spend his time in the post 7,880 miles away on South Georgia, where he will oversee a multi-million pound project aimed at boosting native seabird numbers by removing invasive species such as rats, introduced during two centuries of human occupation of the island.

Professor Elaine Shemilt, a trustee of SGHT and artistic director of the university's Centre for Remote Environments, admitted that at first glance, the recruitment of an eminent biologist to an art college might appear to be an "incongruous" appointment.

But she said the work due to be carried out by Prof Martin was a perfect fit with the type of collaborative research already carried out in Dundee.

Prof Shemilt said: "This is a measure of the sort of collaborative research we do here. We are all artists and designers but we work with a huge spectrum of people from different specialities.

"A lot of artists are passionate about environmental management and sustainability. Artists deal with topical issues all the time and habitat restoration is extremely topical at the moment."

She added: "Tony Martin has been carrying out research into Antarctic regions for nearly ten years, and South Georgia in particular.

"This is the most important island for wildlife and birdlife in the world, and it is vital to restore it to its previous status. To do this, we needed somebody, a scientist, with a huge knowledge of South Georgia and we really have got the best man for the job."

Prof Shemilt said the unusual appointment would be funded by Swedish industrialist Frederik Paulsen, a trustee of the SGHT, through his company Ferrings Pharmaceuticals.

Prof Martin is currently a researcher with the Natural Environment Research Council in Cambridge.

He spent many years as a cetacean biologist with the Sea Mammal Research Unit at St Andrews University before transferring to the British Antarctic Survey.