new flesh for the old fossil
June 2, 2009 8:29 AM   Subscribe

Where art and paleontology intersect, there you'll find Viktor Deak.
posted by flapjax at midnite (4 comments total) 5 users marked this as a favorite
 
Great post. That first image on Deak's page is like looking into a time mirror. There's a little of me in him and a little of him in me. Very strange and beautiful at the same time.
posted by snsranch at 9:28 AM on June 2, 2009


From the end of the first link:

But the real controversy, Mr. Deak said, is in the idea his work represents. When he was waiting tables as a student, he served a family that had just visited the natural history museum. When he said he worked there part time, they were excited — until he said he worked on the Hall of Human Origins.

“They said, ‘Shh, please — don’t say anything around the kids,’ ” he said. “ ‘We believe in a young Earth. We teach our children that we’re made directly in God’s image, and the Earth is about 5,000 years old.’ ”

“Well, did you see the dinosaurs?” he asked.

“ ‘Yes. We tell them these are the creatures that didn’t make it to the Ark.’ ”

“I felt a chill of fear,” Mr. Deak said. “I still do when I think about it. I’ve seen, sometimes firsthand, the evidence that came out of the ground. It’s terrifying that people can look at it and say, ‘It’s not there’ and believe in something that was just dictated to them.”

“But,” he added, “I was a waiter. I wanted a tip. I bit my tongue and just got out of there.”


I lack words to describe this. Imagine being in love with what you do, feeling like you're making a difference in the world, and then realizing that your work is seen as false and demonic.

Especially after the events of a couple of days ago.
posted by Araucaria at 12:15 PM on June 2, 2009


“Any woman who could go to ‘Bodies’ with me and then eat a steak,” he said, “and still be dainty and fun and all, was a girl I could be with forever.”

I'm glad to know he found another such girl because I'm already taken.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 1:28 PM on June 2, 2009 [1 favorite]


Very interesting, thanks for posting.
posted by nola at 2:19 PM on June 2, 2009


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