Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Due to curiosity and interest in art and science of my 6 year old daughter Arina we go to different art galleries and exhibitions in our town as well while traveling. But this visit appeared to be not the routine one… At first glance, the photograph at the Utah Museum of Natural History appeared to be a close-up of a slice of marble, with swirls of blacks, oranges, greens and whites. But the sign nearby said that it was a photo of a fossilized animal dung at twelve time magnification!!! Can you imagine that? I couldn’t believe my eyes. A new museum exhibition called “Ancient Microworlds: Fossils Up Close” features more than 60 such extreme looks at ancient objects. When I looked at the images, they all looked like abstract art to me. One of the closest images peeks at a dinosaur fossil magnified 70 times. There are also magnified fossilized gingko leaves, gastropods and much more. It looks very much like art and my daughter said, that wouldn’t mind having something like that on the wall in her room. Besides art projects, there was a row of microscopes at that exhibition, which grabbed my daughter’s attention. While staring at the walls with my mouth open, I lost the sight of my daughter, but was able to find her at one of the microscopes. She brought a butterfly wing, put it into the microscope focus and was researching it. After a few moments of intense study, she raised her head from the microscope and declared "I like it." Her eyes were shining and she had the biggest smile on her face I’ve ever seen. She was enjoying herself and the microscope, examining everything she could place beneath the microscope, from pieces of paper to sugar and even cotton. I’ve never seen my baby so happy, so for the coming Christmas my husband and I decided that Santa should bring her…. microscope….