Squirrel Database is a participatory archive of squirrel-themed objects, photographs, videos, and digital imagery, gathered largely through gifts received since 2007. Created by artist-researcher Carollyne Yardley, the collection explores how squirrels circulate through visual culture and how an artistic relationship with a species can become a shared activity.
An earlier object anchors the collection: a 1970s chalkware squirrel-shaped coin bank bequeathed to me by my grandmother in 1998. This personal inheritance precedes the hundreds of objects and images subsequently sent by friends, acquaintances, and members of the public. Together, these contributions connect family memory with the unexpected associations through which people encounter and recognize my work.
The collection developed alongside Squirrealism, my artistic practice exploring conceptual and material connections between species. As people encountered the artwork, they began sending squirrel-themed objects, photographs, videos, memes, and news stories. These gifts became another form of participation in the practice, extending its relationships beyond the studio.
Made publicly accessible in spring 2022, the searchable database brings these dispersed contributions into a shared repository. Cataloguing preserves both the objects and, where known, the circumstances of their arrival. The collection becomes a record of squirrel representation and of relationships formed through giving, noticing, and remembering. It asks how a community builds a collection together while apart, and what everyday objects reveal about our attachments to other species.
Use the Browse menu to explore the collection or use Advanced Search to look for objects by keyword, title, accession number, type, or date range.
You can also find posts about the collection on Instagram at @carollyneyardley using #squirreldatabase, and explore the wider artistic practice at carollyne.com.
The archive continues to develop through photography and cataloguing. If an object you contributed does not yet appear online, it may still be awaiting entry.
Some early gifts were received before I began consistently recording contributors’ names. These entries identify the donor as Anonymous. If you recognize an object you gave me and would like its attribution updated, please contact me with the object’s accession number and any information you can share.
This collection exists because people have noticed squirrel-themed objects and images, thought of the project, and shared what they found. Thank you to everyone whose gifts, observations, and curiosity have helped shape the archive.
Technical consultation and database configuration were provided by Graham Nott. Naomi Harding undertook photography and data entry for Phase 1 and Vivian Grace Ostan undertook photography and data entry for Phase 2. Felix Pauliszyn undertook photography, data entry, and updating database organization procedure and documentation as the needs of the database grew with the project’s increased scope for Phase 3.
The database began with a practical question: how could I catalogue a growing collection of physical objects, place them in storage, and continue to access their images and histories? Information initially recorded on yellow sticky notes needed a more durable and searchable home. I considered Excel and Apple Numbers, but entering records directly into a collections-management system offered a way to avoid duplicating work during a later migration.
With research and technical assistance from Graham Nott, I selected CollectiveAccess, an open-source platform for managing and publishing museum and archival collections. My considerations included software support, configurable categories, data import and export, backups, connections to my existing website, and straightforward navigation for visitors.
The records were designed to document each object’s identity, acquisition, and physical characteristics:
Together, these fields allow physical objects to be stored while their images, descriptions, and acquisition histories remain accessible for research.
CollectiveAccess offered installation profiles based on established metadata standards, alongside configurations contributed by other institutions. I selected the New Museum of Contemporary Art profile, listed under Institutional Archives and Special Collections, as a starting point for the collection.
| Configuration | Selection |
|---|---|
| Installation profile | New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York |
| Profile category | Institutional Archives and Special Collections |
| Metadata standard | Dublin Core |
| Supported object types | Collections, datasets, events, images, interactive resources, moving images, physical objects, services, software, sounds, and texts |
This configuration provided a framework for describing physical objects alongside digital contributions, bringing the collection’s different forms into a shared catalogue.
The original installation on our Star Global server involved updating to Apache 2.4 and PHP 5.6. Testing installation profiles allowed me to explore how different configurations handled audio, video, photographs, and object records before settling on a structure. Using an existing profile provided a foundation for consistent naming and description across the collection.
I initially registered imetasquirrel.com for the standalone database, then chose squirreldatabase.com as its public address.
Building the archive involved photographing, measuring, describing, and labelling each object, then entering its information into the database. Each record received an accession number based on the date the object was purchased or gifted to me, using the format SQRL YY/MM/DD. Yellow sticky notes kept with objects since 2007 preserved acquisition details that could be transferred into the catalogue. Multiple photographs allowed different views and identifying features to be recorded.
The project also created opportunities to train assistants in data entry and involve others in documenting the collection. The practical toolkit included a laptop with internet access, a camera, image-editing software such as Photoshop and iPhoto, a label maker, and a measuring tape. Through this work, an accumulation of gifts became a searchable archive while retaining the individual histories attached to its objects.