The American Museum of Natural History was founded in 1869. These are my interpretations of the exhibit that was installed in 1929 and that has changed little since then. In 1974, Hiroshi Sugimoto, one of my favorite photographers, noted that when he first looked at the exhibits they looked fake. He is right stuffed animals standing in front of saturated backdrops are rather unreal and betray an interpretation of nature as benevolent. Today we are in a high definition age and have little patience for the contrived and styized. But the inspiring lesson is that he also noted that if you close one eye the exhibits look rather natural and that he had found a way to see the world as the camera sees. So these are my interpretations of interpretations from a different age. As Sugimoto said "However fake the subject, once photographed it's as good as real."
