amnhnyc:It’s time for #TrilobiteTuesday! It is believed that the great Michelangelo once explained h
amnhnyc:It’s time for #TrilobiteTuesday! It is believed that the great Michelangelo once explained his approach to sculpture by stating that he merely freed already-existing pieces of art from their surrounding stone. While the Renaissance master’s words may have reflected the unique thought process through which he created his renowned works, in the case of trilobite preparators such an approach is exactly how it’s done. Perhaps those who work with fossils don’t possess the inherent artistic elan of the famed Michelangelo, but when all is said and done, they are the ones who truly free existing forms from their encasing stone matrix. Often it can take up to 100 hours of careful preparation work to free all the delicate spines of a trilobite such as this Quadrops flexuosa from the 400 million-year-old Devonian rock. -- source link
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