“BUT, HOW DO YOU KNOW”? USING ART AND DINOSAURS TO FOSTER FAMILY LEARNING AT THE CHILDREN’S MUSEUM OF INDIANAPOLIS; THE PALEOART COLLECTION OF JOHN LANZENDORF

The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis has a long history of providing hands-on, interactive and family oriented learning opportunities for the public.

With the advent of “Dinosphere; Now You’re In Their World”, we’ve taken science and combined it with the imagination of the artists in the Mann Gallery Featuring the Lanzendorf Collection of Paleo Imagery. The main gallery space is an immersive event, where fossils of not only dinosaurs, but plants, mammals, eggs, and various ichnofossils are displayed in a dynamic manner that includes a sound and light show in a recreated tropical environment. Taking the immersive nature even further, TCMI includes an interactive art gallery that invites the public to not only view paleoart, but try their hand at it as well.

Displaying actual fossils, modern animals from the Natural Science Collection and art work from a formerly privately-owned collection, the theme of utilizing science to help make accurate depictions of dinosaurs is combined with each child’s imagination to create his or her own personalized artwork. This, along with interactive activities with gallery staff happening multiple times daily, helps introduce science and family learning in a unique, fun and interesting museum setting.