SITES exhibit, X-Ray Vision: Fish Inside Out, Moves On

 

Radiograph of a Viper moray eel. Radiograph by Sandra Raredon.

X-ray Vision: Fish Inside Out, an exhibition from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES), recently completed its six-month run in the temporary gallery in the Sant Ocean Hall. The exhibit, co-curated by the Fish Division’s Sandra J. Raredon, who prepared the radiographs and photographs, and Lynne R. Parenti, who wrote the text, premiered at the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, New Haven, in mid-2011. 
The exhibition features 40 stunning black-and-white digital prints of fish x-rays.  Arranged in evolutionary sequence, the x-rays give a tour through the long stream of fish evolution. In addition to the 10 SITES venues in the US, the exhibit has also been recreated for the Falmouth Aquarium, England.  The popular exhibit was the first at NMNH in which all the species have a link to a page in the Encyclopedia of Life which may be accessed at http://eol.org/collections/14770