Anyone who has ever looked up into the night sky will be intrigued by “The Evolving Universe,” said Dan Noble, Laman Library’s public relations manager, of the library exhibit opening Saturday in North Little Rock.
The exhibit from the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History includes 27 color photographs,eight light boxes and an introductory video to allow visitors to explore stars, galaxies and into the far reaches of the universe in an interactive fashion.
The exhibit is free and will run through April 6. It will be open during library hours at the exhibit hall of Laman Library, 2801 Orange St., North Little Rock.
“If you’ve ever looked up at the stars and wondered‘What is that?’ you ought to come by and see it,” Noble said of the exhibit. “It answers the question ‘What is out there?.’ … It will show life cycles of stars and explore some black holes. It should be a really, really enjoyable exhibit.
“I think it’s an exhibit for both children and adults,” he added. “For anybody who’s ever had an interest in space or astronomy, it’ll be very interesting. If someone has a telescope and they don’t come here and see this, they’ll probably regret it later.”
Visitors will be able to choose one of two paths to let the exhibit take them through the cosmos, according to the exhibit’s promotional materials. Observers will be able to either begin a journey through the Earth’s solar system and move outward into the universe, or start with the Big Bang theory model for science’s estimate of the earliest development of the universe 13.7 billion years ago and move forward to present day.
“The Evolving Universe” exhibit is a true “get” for the library, Noble said Wednesday, because the exhibit is sponsored through the renowned Smithsonian Museum. The exhibition is in collaboration with the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and part of the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service. The exhibit will be in 16 other cities on a tour lasting through 2017, Noble said, after it leaves North Little Rock.
“Smithsonian exhibits don’t make their way to Arkansas often,” Noble said.
The library paid $7,000 to have the exhibit, Noble said, part of the library’s “investment in the community” to bring exhibitions to the state that many Arkansans might not ever be able to travel to see in big cities like New York City or Washington, D.C.
Such national exhibits at Laman Library have proven to be popular, he said. In 2012, about 17,400 visitors attended exhibits in the Laman Library’s gallery. Last year, visitor numbers to see exhibits grew to more than 23,000, bolstered by more than 8,000 attendees Sept. 6-Dec. 1 for the World Trade Center Recovery Operations exhibit that documented the sorting of debris from the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.
“We’re real proud of that attendance,” Noble said. “We think that says something about people here recognizing that we are a community resource. We think it’s our duty to bring these here.”
Arkansas, Pages 7 on 01/23/2014