Carol Meteyer unfurled the Sandhill crane's gray wings across the steel examination table, and for a moment, the 4-foot-tall bird regained its former majesty. In that instant, the laboratory's windowless cinderblock walls, cement floor and fluorescent lights disappeared. It was easy to imagine the crane's wings cupping the prairie air as it landed in an Oklahoma field, its long gray neck stretched, its red crown the only bright spot in a dun landscape. FedEx had delivered the crane, along with three others, that morning. The day before, it had stood in a farm field in Oklahoma, its head ... Read More
A Chimp Couldn’t Have Created That Painting
March 8, 2011 • By • Leave a Comment
Angry dismissals of abstract art are commonly framed by the assertion. “A (blank) could have done that.” The key word in the clichéd complaint is often “child,” “monkey” or “elephant.” But Jumbo, you’re no Rothko. Newly published research finds that, in spite of our protestations, nonexperts can tell the difference among acclaimed abstract paintings, colorful canvasses created by a nursery school students or residents of the zoo. “People untrained in visual art see more than they realize when looking at abstract expressionist paintings,” Boston College ... Read More
John Gwynne: Bronx Zoo Designer, Conservationist
February 23, 2010 • By • 2 Comments
When he was 9, John Gwynne visited the Bronx Zoo, where for the first time he saw a gorilla, in a claustrophobic cage, in the manner of zoos in the 1950s. The mournful-looking creature impressed him; the confinement saddened him. But Gwynne was also fascinated by a huge cockroach wandering across the floor of the cage. He'd never seen anything like it. Before his 15th birthday, Gwynne told his parents that a good present would be having a pond dug on the family's land on a rural peninsula in southern Rhode Island. "I wanted to create an environment," he says. So his parents hired someone to ... Read More
These Art Critics Love to Ruffle Feathers
November 4, 2009 • By • Leave a Comment
JUST DON'T GET THEM STARTED ON NEO- EXPRESSIONISM If you've ever found yourself shuffling through an art gallery thinking, "This stuff is for the birds," it turns out you're not far wrong. Professor Shigeru Watanabe from Keio University in Japan, writing in the journal Animal Cognition, says pigeons can use color, pattern and texture to distinguish good paintings from bad — just like humans and Sister Wendy do. In the study, watercolors and pastels painted by Tokyo schoolchildren were run past a panel of adults, including the school's art teacher, and judged on the clarity of their ... Read More
Paging Dr. Fido. Dr. Fido to the Recovery Room, Please
July 13, 2009 • By • Leave a Comment
Kate, 14, has been having a tough time coping with Lyme disease and pneumonia, but as she scrunches over to make room on her hospital bed for Jinx, a super-friendly, black-and-white border collie, she brightens visibly. Jinx is a welcome reminder of home and happier times ahead. As she ruffles the thick, glossy coat, Kate talks about her own dog — a golden retriever/collie mix — and other pets waiting for her after she goes home from the hospital. On a recent Friday evening, Jinx and her owner, Mary Arango, began their rounds in intensive care, moved through pediatric and ... Read More
Doctors to Treat You … and Your Pet
February 23, 2008 • By • Leave a Comment
You may share many things with your family pet — your food, your bed, your vacation. But are you ready to share your medical appointments? That could be part of the One World, One Health, One Medicine concept imagined by a group of veterinarians, physicians and public health leaders. Led by past president of the American Veterinary Medical Association Roger Mahr and president of the American Medical Association Ronald Davis, these people are looking at ways of integrating animal and human medicine. They’ve formed the One Health Initiative Task Force, which is considering collaborations ... Read More
