Kathryn Garner
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kathryngarner.co.uk
Kathryn Garner
@kathryngarner.co.uk
720 followers 500 following 460 posts
Artist. I make Cell Paintings, and I write too - mostly about cells, bacteria and/or engineering biology. https://kathryngarner.co.uk
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kathryngarner.co.uk
Day 5 of #artadventcalendar and it's my mycoplasma picture, painted with acrylic paint on paper 🐡

I wanted to add some texture to diagrams of this bacterium, so I copied in a map of the village I grew up in.

Making this gave me lots of ideas for what to do next.
Mycoplasma bacterial cell partly painted as a diagram, partly from a microscope image, and partly as a mash-up with a map of the village I grew up in. Blue, brown and yellow ocre acrylic on paper.
December 5, 2025 at 12:53 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
For day 4 of #artadventcalendar a drawing I made of one of Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin's insulin models focussing on the negative spaces 🐡

Promarkers, felt-tip pens and pencil on paper

From my blogpost about the challenges of insulin folding www.kathryngarner.co.uk/blog/peptide...
My drawing of the negative spaces within one of the models of insulin made by Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin. Most of the shapes are khaki-coloured, but several are golden and another grey.
December 4, 2025 at 9:30 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Day 3 of #artadventcalendar and it's the poisonous Hooded Pitohui (Pitohui dichrous).

This bird carries a neurotoxin in its flesh and feathers, so I've drawn it in a jungle of neurons 🐡

Watercolour and coloured charcoal pencil on paper.
Orange and black hooded pitohui against a jungle of nerve cells. The poison carried by this bird is a neurotoxin. Dark blue neurons against a yellow-orange background with blue dots. Green geometric shapes are seen in the top left quadrant, reminiscent of the light coming down through leaves.
December 3, 2025 at 11:48 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Bonus #artadventcalendar of Christmas Tree Pigeon pin ❤️ by @loadofolbobbins.bsky.social + the River Thames
Pigeon dressed up as a Christmas tree pin on the label of a grey-blue corduroy jacket. River Thames and the city of London in the background.
December 2, 2025 at 12:47 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
For day 2 of #artadventcalendar it's the textile cone snail (Conus textile) illustration I made for a blog post about why disulphide bonds are so important for conotoxin toxicity 🐡

www.kathryngarner.co.uk/blog/cone-sn...
Made using pencil, watercolour and charcoal pencil on paper – a textile cone snail (Conus textile) with disulphide bond structures worked into the triangular pattern on its shell.
December 2, 2025 at 6:10 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Today was a good day. I was asked to clean this model of a leaf and they're going to let me rebuilt and repaint it 😎

You never know when those #sciart skills are going to come in useful!
Teaching model of a leaf of a dicotyledon. Paint is peeling and the plaster is showing in places. The cells are clear and stomata can be seen on the lower side in pink. The top and bottom cell layers are pale grey, whereas the cells in the middle are green.
December 1, 2025 at 5:13 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
It's day 1 of #artadventcalendar and this month I will only be posting work I've made this year!! 😁

First up, my Organoid Holiday Decoration 🐡

Only a few hours left to buy one of these!!
www.backerkit.com/c/projects/k...
Wooden Organoid Holiday Decoration hanging in a fir tree. The decoration has been printed from a painting of a kidney organoid, worked into with elements of an oil rig - particularly cranes make the organoid spiky - and platforms, windows.
December 1, 2025 at 6:28 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Finished!!!! 🎉

We loved doing this moth puzzle by @loadofolbobbins.bsky.social

Buy one here
www.backerkit.com/c/projects/l...

Perhaps I can have my drawing board back now 🤣

🐡 🎨 🖼️
Complete 1000 piece puzzle of coloured moths around a lightbulb
November 23, 2025 at 2:09 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Do you Secret Santa? I've just added some fantastic biology-inspired #secretsanta bundles to my exCELLent Holiday Shop!

Ready-to-ship. Shop before 1st December
www.backerkit.com/c/projects/k...

🐡 🎨 🖼️
#nephsky #pathsky #medsky #biosky
A wooden Organoid Holiday Decoration held up by a hand from its bottom left corner. The decoration has been printed from a painting of a kidney organoid, worked into with elements of an oil rig - particularly cranes make the organoid spiky - and platforms, windows.
November 23, 2025 at 9:57 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Working on some castle pictures for my next project and I can't escape the feeling that this drawing in progress of Chepstow Castle looks like Sid, the sloth from Ice Age! 🤣
Drawing of a plan of Chepstow Castle. Grey-purple watercolour fills the spaces between the walls, which are uncoloured paper (white). Sid the sloth from the film Ice Age
November 19, 2025 at 9:28 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
You'll get one of these stickers from me if you back our 3-way cross-collab! They feature the Hooded Pitohui, a bird in New Guinea that carries poison in its skin and feathers targeting the nervous system 🐡 🎨
Orange and black Hooded Pitohui against a jungle of nerve cells. Featured on a stack of stickers.
November 13, 2025 at 7:00 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Less than 5 days til the Backerkit Holiday Market! Still time to get one of these #spheroid stickers free by registering 🐡 🎨

www.backerkit.com/c/projects/k...

These little aggregations of cells are used to test new medicines. Being 3D they are more like the human body than flat models used before.
Little aggregations of cells called spheroids. Drawn in black biro and shown here as a collection of identical small stickers with a brown paper background.
November 13, 2025 at 6:44 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
We are!!! It has a lovely texture and we love the colours! Just not looking forward to all the white and grey bits!! 😄
Puzzle featuring lots of different brightly coloured moths, in progress.
November 8, 2025 at 3:31 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
I have NEW stickers too that I'm giving away as freebies

#sciart #artsky #nephsky #medsky #pathsky #biosky
Four 5 cm (2") stickers, clockwise from top left: Spheroid Cells Sticker, Pomegranate Sticker, Mycoplasma Bacteria Sticker and Hooded Pitohui Neurons Sticker.
November 8, 2025 at 1:51 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
NEW! A wooden Holiday Decoration of a ball of cells sometimes called a mini-organ or more usually, an #organoid! Here I've imagined an organoid as a self-contained structure, an oil rig with all its working people parts at sea.

#sciart #artsky #nephsky #medsky #pathsky
Unusual and irregular shape painting. Ball of cells in soft blue-green and dark purple, with jagged protrusions with yellow highlights (crane-type structures, as you would see on a building site), and compartment-type structures like rooms or offices highlighted in white.
November 8, 2025 at 11:54 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Learning about cells feeds back into my art, and these days I weave meaning into my paintings. The Kidney Slice paintings combine a sense of the kidney as an organ - a site that filters the blood and removes the waste our body no longer needs.

#sciart #artsky #nephsky #medsky #pathsky
Four bright and glossy rectangle magnets featuring the Kidney Slice paintings. From left to right, Kidney Slice + Water Treatment Plant, Kidney Slice + Cafetiere Plunger, Kidney Slice #3, Kidney Slice + Liverpool Docks.
November 8, 2025 at 11:49 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
The @backerkit.com Holiday Market launches in 10 days and to say we're excited is a massive understatement!!!

There'll be another chance to buy magnets featuring my Cell Paintings. Making these sparked my curiosity and led me to train to be a Scientist!

#sciart #artsky #nephsky #medsky #pathsky
Four bright and glossy rectangle magnets featuring paintings of cells. Clockwise from top left: Small Brown Cell Drawing Magnet, Black Angry Cells Magnet, Orange Cell Drawing Magnet, Purple Cell Drawing Magnet.
November 8, 2025 at 11:44 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
I am also very excited to be collaborating with the super talented @loadofolbobbins.bsky.social and @annieshaoart.bsky.social for the upcoming first ever @backerkit.com Holiday Market!!

I'll be giving away my new sticker of a poisonous hooded pitohui in a jungle of neurons if you back all 3 of us 🐡
Orange and black hooded pitohui against a jungle of nerve cells. The poison carried by this bird is a neurotoxin.
November 4, 2025 at 4:21 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
You'll bag a FREE bacteria sticker if you buy from my exCELLent Holiday Shop in the first 48 hours!

Plus sign up here for an extra pre-launch follower freebie!!
www.backerkit.com/call_to_acti...

#artsky #sciart #illustration #scicomm #painting #pathsky #medsky #bioart #biosky
Mycoplasma bacterial cell partly painted as a diagram, partly from a microscope image, and partly as a mash-up with a map of the village I grew up in. Blue, brown and yellow ocre acrylic on paper printed as a 5cm sticker.
November 2, 2025 at 9:39 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Found this old painting of a pomegranate this morning - making my new #organoid Cell Paintings has reminded me of it. It's funny the work you keep versus the things you throw away.

Holiday Shop coming up - register your interest 🐡
www.backerkit.com/call_to_acti...
A slice through a pomegranate painted loosely in pink, orange and red acrylic paint on paper.
October 31, 2025 at 8:09 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Ok, organoid painting day 2 and I must keep remembering that you don't know what something will look like until you make it!! I abandoned yesterday's painting and started smaller, more controlled. It's not finished yet but I'm very pleased 😁

It's a #kidney #organoid mash-up with an oil rig 🤣🐡
Acrylic paint on paper painting of a kidney organoid (ball of cells) mash up with an oil rig. The darks are maroon and the lights are pale blue-green, with the mid-tones in-between.
October 28, 2025 at 6:30 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
Enjoying pushing paint around this afternoon making some #kidney organoid holiday decorations.

Click here to register your interest
www.backerkit.com/call_to_acti...

Everyone needs #organoid holiday decorations, right? #sciart
Ball of cell-like structures, toothpaste green with mauve background. Cobalt blue and crimson accents - the blue is probably nuclei.
October 27, 2025 at 4:59 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
#spheroids can vary considerably in size and shape, yet to be used in drug discovery, they must be as consistent as possible to produce meaningful results.

I'm turning this #illustration into Holiday Decorations - watch this space! 🐡 🎨 #biosky 🎄❄️
An illustration of approximately 13 spheroids, small floating aggregates of cells, that can be used at scale in the lab to test medicines in development. Watercolour and black biro on paper.
October 11, 2025 at 7:53 AM
kathryngarner.co.uk
What a lot of magnets!!!!! 🐡
Photograph of assorted rectangle magnets printed with images of brightly coloured Cell Paintings
October 9, 2025 at 2:48 PM
kathryngarner.co.uk
I'm not sure how many of these I'll manage, but I felt inspired by the first #invertober2025 prompt -

So here's my Japanese sea nettle (Chrysaora pacifica) with its tangly tentacles!

Watercolour and pastel pencil on paper, A4.

#invertober #sciart
Japanese sea nettle (Chrysaora pacifica). The bell is pale orange-pink with darker segments radiating out from its centre with dark purple or maroon edges. The tentacles are a similar colour to the bell and are tangly (difficult to draw!) against a turquoise (lower) and khaki green (upper) sea behind.
October 1, 2025 at 8:29 AM