M is for Marley

~We went on this awesome field trip about 2 weeks ago~

We had the opportunity to visit with a local artist, Christopher Marley, who has a studio/warehouse (not sure what to call it because it's not really a place you can visit anytime to view his artwork) down in Salem. The facility we visited is where they make and develop his artwork. He talked to us about how he makes his pictures, animal conservation, and showed us some cool pieces of art (some finished and some in progress).

While we were waiting for everyone to arrive he gave the kids some of his books to look through. His artwork is created with real insects, snakes, fish, and many other kinds of animals. These books feature many of the things he has created. I even checked the books out from the library afterward, so that my kids could continue to look. They all found this field trip (as did I) very fascinating.

This book, Biophilia, is the exhibit guide. This exhibit of his is coming to OMSI in the Fall. We are very excited to see his exhibit, and it will be pretty cool to say we met that guy!

The guy in the picture below is the artist himself, Christopher Marley. He showed the kids all kinds of things, and was so nice. He answered their questions, told them facts about all the animals and insects in his pictures, told us his process of freeze drying the specimens for his artwork, and so much more. The kids loved this snake picture.

As I said, I went and checked out the books from the library system. The kids have liked looking through it and remembering the things he talked about on the field trip.

 There is a lot of information about each of the insects/animals in the books too.

There was even a counting board book featuring his insect art.

 That wraps up the letter M!