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Nathalie Odette 


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Nathalie Odette: https://nathalie-odette.squarespace.com/

In the art and craft of natural (history) preservation Nathalie Odette has found a way to
combine her fascination with science to her desire for a more intimate connection to the
natural world.

Never losing a sense of wonder for these treasures of nature that are so close to her heart, she
has by trial and error refined her own techniques and protocols while still paying homage to the
historical tradition of natural history preservation.

As a research technician in biomedical sciences currently employed at Amsterdam UMC she has
always been inspired by the techniques of preserving tissues and cells and struck by the
aesthetic side of that. Being used to a laboratory environment it was only a small leap to a
different kind of experimentation.

Nathalie Odette's preparations are an offering to often overlooked beauty, to the micro worlds
that surround us, to the rapidly disappearing natural world.
‘Fluid preservation refers to specimens and objects that are preserved in fluids, most commonly
alcohol and formaldehyde, but also glycerin, mineral oil, acids, glycols, and a host of other
chemicals that protect the specimen from deterioration. Some of the oldest natural history
specimens in the world are preserved in fluid.’ (John E. Simmons, 2014)

Preserving in liquid can to a certain extent enable the specimen to keep their original shape and
size- as opposed to dry methods of preservation. Being suspended in liquid and encapsulated in
glass also provides a certain luminosity to a specimen. The liquid acts almost as a magnifying
glass, creating a clarity that is unparalleled by any other conservation technique. There can be a
tenderness to these delicate specimens, suspended in time.

Fluid preservation of botanical specimens has been practiced as long as the process of fluid
preservation itself but it is somehow lesser known. Nathalie has rediscovered this art and craft
and through continuous experimentation made it her own.