Art in the Age of Dinosaurs at the NMMNHS
5:29 am
This Thursday, June 25, I’ll be giving a talk and tour called “Art in the Age of Dinosaurs” as part of the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science’s Curator’s Coffee program. Light refreshments and an informal presentation will kick off the program at 9:30, followed by a guided tour of the art on display in the Museum’s recently renovated Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous halls.
The NMMNHS has a fantastic collection of natural history art commissioned specifically for its exhibits. Highlights on the tour will include Margaret Colbert’s Dawn of the Dinosaurs paintings (detail shown above), Dave Thomas’ life-size bronze dinosaurs, Spike and Alberta, Ely Kish’s Jurassic murals, mosasaur and dinosaur sculptures by Stephen Czerkas, plus works by Karen Carr, Gary Staab, and many others. We’ll take a look at some of the science behind the art, techniques that were used to create the pieces, and how our views of the past have changed since some of these works were completed.
The whole shebang costs $7 ($3 for museum members) and is limited to 20 participants. I’m told that there are a few spaces left. If you would like to join in, you can either download a registration form or simply email programs.NMMNHS[at]state.nm.us to reserve a space.
Arhg! If only it weren’t 6 hours away and this week!
I hope you have fun!
Brett
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Sorry we will miss this. We’ll have to schedule a visit, but probably not till after April.
Greg
I think I’ve seen that picture before, Matt. Did it also appear in the first volume of “Dinosaurs: Past & Present” as part of a multi-panel mural?
Hi Zach -
Yep, you nailed it. Dr. David Gillette (the NMMNH paleontology curator at the time) wrote an article for the Dinosaurs Past & Present volume called “The Age of Transition: Coelophysis and the Late Triassic Chinle Fauna.” It is a very good overview of institutionally-affiliated (UC Berkeley, Petrified Forest, NMMNH) reconstructions of the Chinle environment in the pre-Doug Henderson era.
Margaret Colbert did Chinle murals for the Petrified Forest and the NMMNH (and later oversaw the creation of a mural for the Ruth Hall Museum of Paleontology at Ghost Ranch). More information about her work can be found in the biography Charming the Bones by Ann Brimacombe Elliot (which can be found used for a song on Amazon).
Although somewhat dated, Mrs. Colbert’s mural is one of my favorite pieces of art at the NMMNH.