Steve Pollick of the Toledo Blade has a great review of an exhibit currently showing at the Toledo Museum of Art.  An artist has constructed an imaginary rain forest and placed paintings of species discovered since 1990 within trees and branches.  It sounds very interesting.  Story excerpts and link:

It took the artist three years, poring over journals, corresponding with field researchers, and visiting museums around the world to paint these canvases, which respectively depict life on the forest floor, the understory, and the canopy. At one point in her recorded commentary, Kirkland notes three times she sanded out the central portion of the panel dealing with the forest floor because she was dissatisfied with her rendering of fish and salamander beneath the surface of a stream.

“I actually spent about an hour along a coastal stream in Costa Rica,” she says, “and took dozens of pictures of how the light bounced off the surface, and how it reflected the colors – the sky, the leaves – what kind of sand, what kind of pebbles would be there.

The fact that the panels are composite of many species from many habitats should be no distraction. In fact it is encouragement to allow your own imagination – and perhaps memories of personal rain forest experiences – to synchronize with Kirkland’s.

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080907/COLUMNIST22/809070369/-1/RSS06

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