Public art installations of cows and horses have graced city streets in the past. Giant butterflies can now be added to the list.
About 20 butterfly sculptures — each six feet high — were unveiled Thursday outside the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum as part of the museum’s “Flight of the Butterflies” public art project.
The sculptures will be on display at the museum until July, when all of them — 29 in all — will flutter to new homes in the Magnificent Mile, Lincoln Park and in city parks on the South and West Sides. Most of the butterflies are outside the museum, so visitors don’t need to pay admission to see them.
The program is reminiscent of the Cows on Parade public art installation that hit the streets in 1999, and the horse sculptures that were placed around the city in 2014 to benefit the Chicago Police Memorial Foundation.
“Flight of Butterflies embodies the nature museum’s mission to connect people to nature,” Erin Amico, the nature museum’s president and CEO, said Thursday. “With the many rising threats to our environment, creating connection to nature has never been more relevant, nor more important.”
The sculptures were created by a diverse group of both experienced and emerging artists, as well as community groups, some of which work with unhoused artists, people with developmental disabilities and youth. The designs showcase a wide variety of media, including acrylic paint, fabric, mosaic tiles, African beads and even blankets.
For non-binary artist Moises Salazar Tlatenchi, nature is a safe space to be themself.
“I’m very conscious of how I present myself, where I can go,” said the 27-year-old Woodlawn resident who uses they/them pronouns. “But in nature, I feel safe regardless, it’s a space where you can be allowed to be yourself.”
So when Salazar Tlatenchi was asked to participate in the project, they approached the gig with the same sense of freedom: a drag queen’s eyes decorate the butterfly’s wings, accompanied by lots of color and glitter.
Salazar Tlatenchi’s butterfly is located near the main entrance of the museum, 2430 N. Cannon Dr., and will later be placed in Ping Tom Memorial Park.
“Art and storytelling are powerful tools to ignite our imagination and inspire ideas around how we can connect and champion the natural world,” Amico said. “Chicago’s diverse and talented artists are some of our city’s greatest ambassadors. Their diversity and vibrancy is what makes Chicago so great.”
Also on Thursday, the museum unveiled its new logo, which is a mix of a butterfly and a flower.
The creatures have been a key attraction since the museum opened in the fall of 1999 and visitors immediately fell in love with its walk-through butterfly exhibit.
