Tracy Hicks Installation in Noyce Science Center

Noyce Science Center, second floor, northwest corner

View the installation

Dallas artist Tracy Hicks created still/LIFE in response to the severe endangerment of approximately one third of the earth's 6000 known amphibian species-- frogs, toads, salamanders, even wormlike caecilians-within the last ten years due to adverse ecological change. Since 1980, 122 species may have become extinct entirely. The piece is intended to provide a space for intellectual as well as articstic reflection on the fate of species.

Still/LIFE raises the questions: what does it mean to preserve? Why do we preserve some things and not others?

The frogs and toads in still/Life were cast from specimens at the Field Museum in Chicago and the Biodiversity Center at the University of Kansas in translucent urethane and silicone infused with colored pigments as well as florescent and phosphorescent dyes. Black lights hung above the jars provide and entirely different atmosphere and color palette at night.

The Faulconer Gallery invited Tracy Hicks to Grinnell to create still/LIFE in conjunction with the 2008 Tall Grass Bioneers Conference (October 31 - November 2, 2008). His visit was sponsored by the Faulconer Gallery, Biology Department, and Chemistry Department.

No live animal specimens were used in the making of the installation, with the exception of one preserved frog and a few insects, all of which died of natural causes.

Tracy Hicks, still/LIFE, 2008. 19th/20th century preservation jars, water, alcohol, mineral oil, phosphorescent dyes, fluorescent dyes, colored pigments, rubber, glass, wood.