Australian Museum

Today, I went to the Australia Museum. The was a Wildlife Photography exhibit that knocked my socks off. I had that feeling I get sometimes watching performances or looking at great art - that sense of how much beauty is all around us. It makes me want to cry and hug people.

I bought this cool booklet with all the images I saw. They didn't have many of the ones I really liked on postcards. Some of them were simply arresting. A partial polar bear silhouette, taken at sunrise so all is black except for a few "lines" showing the bear's shape. Snow leopards. A tree frog in a deadly embrace with a tree-snake; "It was a stalemate. Three hours later I realized the the first one to give in would, in fact, be me ... and I went to bed." Some great macaque pictures. Cypress trees. A toadstool in the rain. Have I bored you yet? The images wouldn't.

Here's a couple I saw before I realized I was going to buy something with all the images:

Malaria bumps in red blood cells.











The devastating effects of grazing. The left side is a fenced in area used for grazing ... there is no trick photography.







There are also categories for entries by kids of different ages. The blurbs by these photos often said something like: "I was in Madagascar on vacation with my family ..." or "My dad said to stay really still until I had the photo I wanted, or the Grizzly might come after me ..." implying some privilege in access to wildlife in its habitat as well as access to good photographic equipment. But all of the quotes also had things like "I had to experiment to get the exposure right" or "I was really struck by the yellow head against the black body and had to position myself just right and was lucky the butterfly landed where I needed it" and other things making you realize that these are special, talented kids. Some of the photos did come from their backyards ... but not many.

For good measure, here is a photo I took of a stuffed wombat.