Exhibition Design:
Through the Microscope
Audience: Non-scientific audience, Tang Gallery, Skidmore College
Client: Senior Thesis in Communication Design
Format: 13 hanging 5ft x 5ft digital prints & printed microbe guide
Tools used: Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign
Completed: May 2025
Microbe Guide
Microbes are Earth’s first inhabitants, evolving over 3.5 billion years ago and are fundamentally intertwined with all life on earth today. They act as the base of the food web, supply global oxygen cycles, decompose organic matter, and much more. Despite their profound impact, microbes are often forgotten by non-scientific audiences because they are invisible to the human eye.
The aim of this exhibition is to immerse the audience into the microbial world and explore fundamental aspects of microbial science. This exhibition includes printed illustrations hanging from the ceiling representing 7 unique microbes. In addition, viewers can identify and learn more about the microbes on display through the provided microbe guide.
Right Wall of Exhibit
Left Wall of Exhibit
1. Research and Reference Collection
You+Pea is an architectural design studio from which I found frequent inspiration during the conceptualization of this project. Specifically, their work inspired my color palette, gradients of complimentary colors that are bold and bright. In addition, I was captivated by the immersive feeling in the illustrations, they are chaotic yet clean and free and make the viewer want to look closer at the details.
Reference images of microscopic organisms, mostly green alga, were taken on multiple types of light microscopes and a confocal fluorescent microscope.
Research about the microbes I wanted to illustrate helped inform my design decisions. Learning about the form and internal structures of each microbe guided the elements I would illustrate. In addition, these findings served as the basis for the written microbe guide.
2. Pre-Production
To plan the physicality of this project, I measured the space and created rough mockups of the exhibition. This helped me decide the number and size of the microbes I would be displaying in order to make the viewer feel immersed within the microbial world.
4. Production of Microbe Guide
5. Microbe Assembly & Installation
Bonus: My beloved production calendar inspired by Corita Kent’s Immaculate Heart College art department “10 Rules”.
Lauren Kussro is interested in how organisms interact to exist within a whole. She takes inspiration from biological subject matters both on the macro and molecular scale. In this work I am intrigued by the physicality of the material hanging along a wall, the shadows it casts, and the windows that are created into different layers.
3. Production of Microbes
Images above are the Adobe Illustrator art boards of each microbe. I enjoyed experimenting with vectorized effects and transparency layers.
To accompany this exhibition, I needed a way to inform the audience about the scientific concepts behind my work. To do this, I created an 8-panel microbe guide that would allow the viewer to identify the microbes on display and learn more about them. I displayed these microbe guides in two plastic containers along the walls of the exhibition (not pictured). Pictured below is my process to develop this microbe guide.
