Wild

Manchester Museum

Wild explores our relationship with the natural world and looks at how people across the globe are creating, rebuilding and repairing connections with nature.

Wild will challenge the way we think about nature, whisking you to wild places across the world to hear a diverse range of voices, from Aboriginal elders to researchers and community activists. Find out how they’re shaping their environments and looking to wild for a more positive future. In one case, the restoration of traditional practices is helping to heal both the land and the people. In others, biodiversity has exploded where farmland has been rewilded and the reintroduction of animal species is helping to restore ecological balance. Featuring an immersive installation, audio, film and interactive elements, alongside natural history collections and artworks, the exhibition prompts you to notice the biodiversity and heritage of the featured environments while questioning our relationship with the natural world.

Beyond the use of track spotlights to create both general and focused illumination, the lighting concept invites visitors to look closer and discover the hidden details within each display case. Subtle case lighting — from concealed LED strips to delicate stem spots — softly reveals the objects, enhancing their textures and forms. Meanwhile, gobo projectors, picture lights, and pendant fixtures helped shape an atmosphere that transports visitors to another place, where architecture and light come together to tell a story.