How do creative minds bring to life the fantasy and sci-fi worlds of Avatar, Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings, and Star Wars, and video games like Monster Hunter, Elden Ring, and Pokémon? What would these worlds and the creatures in them be like if not for our knowledge of the vast fossil record and geologic history? Our modern world is rich with inspiration, but it is grounded and preceded by the past. 99% of all life is extinct and our modern world represents a fraction of Earth’s 4.6-billion-year history. Join Dr. Kiersten Formoso and discover the rich way that paleontology and geology have influenced creative minds. 

Collateral & Co. returns to the Museum for a multi-disciplinary, evening-length dance work that examines the fragile and ephemeral nature of life through the presence and experience of the endangered monarch butterfly. Fragments of Existence follows the butterfly’s remarkable metamorphosis – its delicate appearance, the threat to its survival, and its graceful, impermanent existence – as a mirror to explore human transience, the passage of time, and our own vulnerability within the larger web of human life.

Featuring poetry by Melanie Perish and Collateral & Co. Artistic Director, Caitlin Bell, time-lapse sketching by scientist and artist Tiffany Pereira, and choreography by Caitlin Bell in collaboration with Collateral & Co. Dance Artists, the boundary between human and insect blurs, emphasizing our shared fragility and interdependence. Offering a reflection on our own place in the ever-changing fabric of life, Fragments of Existence is a call to awareness and action: a celebration of beauty, a meditation on mortality, and a call to protect what is at risk before it is too late.

This coming-of-age documentary directed by Paige Bethmann follows Ku Stevens, a 17-year-old Native American runner. As Ku struggles to navigate his dream of becoming a collegiate athlete, the memory of his great grandfather’s escape from an Indian boarding school begins to connect past, present, and future.

In celebration of Older Americans Month, the Museum offers FREE admission to seniors every Wednesday during the month of May.

In celebration of Older Americans Month, the Museum offers FREE admission to seniors every Wednesday during the month of May.

In celebration of Older Americans Month, the Museum offers FREE admission to seniors every Wednesday during the month of May.

In celebration of Older Americans Month, the Museum offers FREE admission to seniors every Wednesday during the month of May.

Mary Anning was a pioneering paleontologist and fossil collector, yet little is known about her life. Anning’s history is incomplete and contradictory, her lifetime was a constellation of firsts. Join us for a discussion with Megan Bellister, Nell J. Redfield Curator of Learning and Engagement, as she places Mary Anning in historical and cultural context through the fashions of the time.

Denise Dutton, Statue of Mary Anning, 2022

Using camera lenses made of glacier ice, artist Tristan Duke explores our current moment of climate crisis. As Peter E. Pool Fellow at the Nevada Museum of Art’s Center for Art + Environment, the artist used his ice-lens camera to document the rapidly melting glaciers of the Sierra Nevada. Join us for a talk concluding his fellowship, and a preview of his book “Glacial Optics” forthcoming from Radius Books. 

Wendy Calvin, a planetary scientist specializing in optical and infrared spectroscopy of minerals and ices, discusses many different planets, why scientists believe these planets have interior oceans and upcoming missions that will expand our understanding in new ways.