Comedian Josie Long has been turned into a superhero as part of a new exhibition.

Cosmic Superheroes is a photographic celebration of the superpowers it has taken for women at the forefront of the worlds of Arts and Science to establish themselves as superheroes in their individual fields.

Trent Burton and Melinda Burton, two of the Producers of The Cosmic Shambles Network, came up with the idea for Cosmic Superheroes during a conversation with colleagues at the time of the launch of the movie of Wonderwoman.

Trent explains: “There was a lot of talk about how it was great to see a female superhero, and a big comic book film that empowered the female lead and had strong feminist undertones. And that is unquestionably true, and excellent, but there was also a lot of talk around how she was still clearly required to get about in her smalls a lot of the time.

So I suggested that we ask some of the people with whom we work regularly to come up with suggestions for superpowers that they felt would go into making their own superheroes. They didn’t even have to have the usual superhuman powers if they didn’t want, because we felt that becoming a professor of physics or palaeobiology was a superpower enough.”

Those being photographed for the exhibition include Josie Long, Physicist Helen Czerski, Professor of Physics Lucie Green, Poet Salena Godden, Archeologist Brenna Hassett, Social Activist Nimco Ali, Poet Hollie McNish, Folk-singer and Songwriter Grace Petrie, Science Writer and Presenter Kat Arney, Psychologist and Epidemiologist Suzi Gage, Science Communicator Ginny Smith and Paleobiologist Tori Herridge and others.

Josie Long designed her own superhero costume. She says: "The reason I wanted to make a costume that was a homemade cape of books, and the reason I wanted my superhero to be fairly low key and natural was I wanted to represent scruffy, bookish women who like to self-educate and the power that exists in knowing who you are, and being that, and not giving a damn about other people’s opinions of what that means."

Timothy Ginn, is a studio photographer who has been in the creative business for over 20 years completing a varied range of tasks from making Ronnie Barker a turkey sandwich at a Recording Studio to photographing amazing people and things in studios across London. He received his Ba Hons in Graphic Arts and Design in 2008 from Leeds Metropolitan University.

Many of the superheroes from the exhibition will also be appearing in Robin Ince’s legendary Christmas Variety shows, Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People, (which is also Produced by The Cosmic Shambles Network)on 16th, 19th, 20th and 22nd December. Four nights of science, comedy, music at London’s iconic Conway Hall, which is also where the exhibition is.

Cosmic Superheroes: A photographic celebration of  real-life female Superheroes

Venue: Conway Hall, 

25 Red Lion Square, London, WC1R 4RL 

Dates: 8th December 2017 to 31st January 2018 

Time: 10am to 6pm 

Online: cosmicshambles.com/superheroes

Photo credit: Timothy Ginn