Photo of a pygmy chameleon Catherine Chalmers

If you're a true devotee of biodiversity, a believer in the inherent worth of all species, not just iconic ones like the soaring eagle and the cuddly koala, then logically you would have to appreciate the importance (and the improbable beauty) of even the humblest creatures. That's the unspoken premise of the work of New York photographer and video artist Catherine Chalmers. In a recent short video called Safari, Chalmers strives to see the world through the eyes of an insect, "to try to understand what it is not to be human." Hungry predators lurk in the foliage, stag beetles lock horns in mortal combat, flesh-eating plants envelop hapless flies. The lives of bugs, she says, involve "things that we consider amoral, horrifying, and really bizarre." Like walking unsuspecting into the waiting jaws of this pygmy chameleon.