Image of Jenny Kendler's drawing series "The Extinction Portraits" showing people wearing extinct species masks Image of Jenny Kendler's drawing series "The Extinction Portraits" showing people wearing extinct species masks

Installation view of The Extinction Portraits, 2007

Graphite on paper, painted frames, hand-dyed funerary ribbons, custom brass plaques

This series of graphite drawings, shown at a solo show entitled Wunderkammer at Kasia Kay Art Projects, features portraits of human beings wearing masks of extinct animals. Each person is drawn from a portrait taken in the year each animal became extinct -- raising questions of identity, culpability & grief. How do we assimilate and deal with irreparable loss? How do we as human beings take on the identities of these lost animal species?

The 'museum-style' brass plaque below each portrait is inscribed with the animal's common name, its scientific name, and the year in which it became extinct.