My friend and critique partner, Maya Reynolds, just sent me a link to the American Museum of Natural History's website. Last week they opened an exhibit called "Mythic Creatures", and it looks like SO much fun!

Here's a bit from the Introduction to the exhibit:

"The world is full of stories about brave heroes, magical events and fantastic beings. For thousands of years, humans everywhere—sometimes inspired by living animals or even fossils—have brought mythic creatures to life in stories, songs and works of art. Today these creatures, from the powerful dragon to the soaring phoenix, continue to thrill, terrify, entertain and inspire us.

We seem to catch glimpses of these creatures all around us: hiding beneath the ocean waves, running silently through the forest and soaring among the clouds. Some symbolize danger. Others, we think, can bring us luck or joy. Together mythic creatures give shape to humankind's greatest hopes, fears and most passionate dreams."

Gives me goosebumps. :-)

It's hard to tell from the website how well balanced it is, ethnically, but it looks like they did a decent job. Creatures from European and Asian mythology are well represented, of course, but I also caught mention of myths from Africa, Australia and South America.

A part of me is a little afraid that seeing the physical representations of the mythic creatures might make take away some of their "magic" -- but mostly I just think it would be cool. :-)

I'm going to keep my fingers crossed that this exhibit will travel -- It looks fun, but I don't think I could justify a plane ticket to New York...

The image above is from the "Creatures of the Deep" portion of the exhibit.