Exploring Art, Nature, and City with the Ghost of Darwin

Artist’s talk with Gail Wight

Friday, November 13, 4:00- 6:00 PM

If Charles Darwin were to come to your neighborhood today, and you could show him just a few things, what would they be? Artist Gail Wight, Associate Professor of Art at Stanford University, takes Darwin's ghost for a tour around the San Francisco Bay area, seeks out local flora and fauna he would relish, addresses the legacy of his ideas, and considers environmental degradation over the intervening years. She will discuss this and other new works of art involving science collections, as well as a brief survey of her recent projects. Free and open to the public at 26 Oxford Street. Following the talk join the artist in the museum galleries. Cosponsored with the Studio for Interrelated Media at MassArt.
Learn more about the artwork of Gail Wight.
Photo by L.A. Cicero / Stanford News Service.

Mothers and Others: The Origin of Emotionally Modern Humans

Lecture and booksigning/reception by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy

Wednesday, November 18, 6:00 PM

Anthropologist and primate sociobiologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy studies how the apes in the line leading to the genus Homo became so "other-regarding" and potentially cooperative. Hrdy will discuss her newest book, Mothers and Others, in which she emphasizes the need to consider our Pleistocene ancestors' peculiar mode of child-rearing. Following the lecture, there will be a booksigning and reception with the author in the museum galleries. Free and open to the public in the Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street. Cosponsored with the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard and the Harvard University Press. To share this event with others download the lecture poster.

Image credit: Sophie Bassouls. 

Six Years on Mars

Lecture by Andrew Knoll

Thursday, December 10, 6:00 PM

Harvard biologist Andrew Knoll hasn’t actually been to Mars, but he has spent a lot of time examining its rocks, including four-billion-year-old salt deposits investigated by the rovers Spirit and Opportunity. Knoll will reflect on six years of NASA Mars Rover exploration; what the evidence tells us about the history of water and its implication for life on the ancient surface of the Red Planet. Intended audience is teens and older. Free and open to the public in the Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street.  

Note: The museum's galleries will be open both before and after the lecture. See Night at the Museum below.

Night at the Museum

Thursday, December 10, 5:00 - 8:00 PM

Free admission from 5:00 to 8:00 pm. Check out  the newly restored Great Mammal Hall and visit the Evolution and Language of Color exhibitions. Take 20% off your purchase at the Museum Shop (not to be combined with other discounts.)

Note: Free public lecture at 6:00 pm by Harvard Professor Andrew Knoll. See above.