Event Description
Tiktaalik roseae goes on display at the Academy one final time before being returned to Canada, where it was discovered.
Tiktaalik roseae, the fossil lobe-finned fish that helps illustrate the evolutionary transition between finned and limbed animals, has made a profound impact on both our scientific and popular culture. The Academy’s Ted Daeschler, along with Neil Shubin from the University of Chicago, discovered Tiktaalik during summer expeditions (2000-2008) to the southern part of Ellesmere Island in the Nunavut Territory of Arctic Canada. In A Farewell to Fins, the key specimen of Tiktaalik will be on display one last time before all the fossils travel back to their country of origin. Alongside the Late Devonian fossils will be displays of cartoons, toys, books, a Canadian coin, a bottle of beer, and other cultural materials that use Tiktaalik’s likeness to refer to the point in time when a fish crawled out of the water and everything changed—forever.
A Farewell to Fins will run from May 2–June 7, 2015 in the Independence Foundation Gallery, just outside of the Academy's auditorium. |
