Mobile Meme

During the past two decades, Mark Dion has created a skull-staving catalogue of projects exploring how nature is represented in science and culture. The artist’s South Florida Wildlife Rescue Unit is a large-scale installation that focuses on the Everglades and human attempts to control the South Florida ecosystem. Dion’s mustard-colored contraption resembles a food truck that has been retrofitted into a rolling bio lab and freighted with sundry microscopes, bug nets, wild animal snares, and cages. The artist’s snazzy wheels are designed to represent a bogus agency that rushes into vulnerable ecosystems to rescue endangered plants and animals. It’s a timely commentary on the need for more responsible stewardship of our natural surroundings and the unbridled exploitation of our biological resources. Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Miami Art Museum, Dion will be joined at an opening reception by Michael Grunwald, author of The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise, in a dialogue about Wildlife Rescue Unit and environmental changes in South Florida. “Dion’s installation tells the story of the various mentalities and motivations, both positive and negative, which have determined our history with Florida’s wilderness,” says Peter Boswell, Miami Art Museum’s assistant director for programs and senior curator. Tickets cost $10 and are free for MAM members. See Dion’s South Florida Wildlife Rescue Unit in the museum’s Anchor Gallery.
Tuesdays-Sundays, 6 p.m. Starts: March 10. Continues through Aug. 28, 2011