New York Times | What Does An Ant Smell Like? Find Out at This Museum

10.23.2025

NEWSROOM

ant on a green leaf

A new exhibition at the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Conn., gives visitors a whiff, from “chocolate-y” to stinky blue cheese.

This article is part of the Fine Arts & Exhibits special section on how creativity can inspire in challenging times.


The office where Daniel Ksepka was working was overrun with ants. On the wall above the desk were army ants, bull ants, leaf-cutter ants and turtle ants. On a shelf were two honeypot ants that looked as if they had yellow balloons where their stomachs should have been.

Kspeka, the curator of science at the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Conn., did not call an exterminator.

There was no need to: None of the ants in the office were real. The ones on the wall were drawings. The honeypot ants were plastic models made on the museum’s 3-D printer in preparation for an exhibition called “Ants: Tiny Creatures, Big Lives” that will open on Nov. 13.

A smiling man wearing glasses and a black jacket stands against a blue sky.
Daniel Ksepka, the curator of science at the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Conn.Credit…via Bruce Museum
A few dozen ants crawl across leaves they have woven together.
A colony of green tree ants has woven several leaves together to guard their herd of honeydew-producing scale insects. The great number of guard ants is present because the photographer breathed on the nest.Credit…Alex Wild

“I love ants,” Ksepka said. “They keep the world running.”

Let him count the ways.

Continue reading on New York Times…

GET IN TOUCH