We live in a time when an alarming number of species are going extinct in a world increasingly dominated and altered by an exploding human population.  How do we fully understand such an overwhelming topic?  Perhaps an emotional understanding of the issue is just as crucial as the facts.  But how do we arrive at that?  How do we feel connected?  How do the sciences and the arts work together?

This exhibition is an immersive experience that evokes a profound sense of empathy with our “next of kin”— particularly those that have already gone extinct or are threatened with extinction right now.  At the core of the installation are the type of specimens that you find elsewhere in the museum but presented in a way that seeks to address this other, more emotional understanding — in one instance, through Seely’s mirrored portraits of extinct or threatened animals; and in the other through the unusual presentation of museum specimens.