We regret the error

YanquiUXO, the Reddit user who originally posted this sign says that it comes from the Harvard Museum of Natural History, which hosts an annual event that allows artists to set up installations and performance art inside the museum. This is one of those pieces.

I can't find the name of the artist of this particular piece, though, so if you know, holler.

Many of the Redditors have wondered whether this piece took real-life inspiration from a lion that was famously (poorly) taxidermied for the King of Sweden in 1731. I have no idea, but the lion itself must be seen to be believed. The derp is strong with this one.

Image via Ed Yong

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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MORE: Art and Design • Funny • herp derp • museum • Science

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http://twitter.com/digitalArtform Joseph Francis

That lion has to be my next Twitter avatar
- catgrin
  
  Sorry Joseph, I’m sure you can understand why I have to snake it as a FB profile pic. ;)
Brainspore

It’s like the taxidermist was working from another person’s vague description of what a lion looked like, and that second person’s knowledge of lions came solely from old Disney cartoons.
- Maggie Koerth-Baker
  
  From what I read, the taxidermist’s second-hand knowledge of lions actually came from coats of arms. Which makes a lot more sense. Especially when the lion is viewed from the side.
  - Brainspore
    
    I wonder if any of Ub Iwerks’ ancestors were doing coat-of-arms gigs back then.
Jim Phelps

When I was work at UT-Knoxville, there was an art install in the library. It was a centaur fossil dig complete with bow (see it here: http://www.lib.utk.edu/aboutlibs/hodges/centaur.html) After it was up for a week or so, fliers appeared next to it that explained that centaurs are mythological creatures and that this was an art install (not science).
- http://QuixoticJedi.com niceguyted
  
  404 link.
phlavor

WTF? That thing will haunt my dreams for weeks. Apple should have used that one for 10.7.
OldBrownSquirrel

A few of the older HMNH specimens are a bit zoologically improbable, though they’re far better than the notorious Swedish lion. Really, though, the saddest thing is the giraffe held together with packing tape. Not all the mounted specimens are aging well, and they’re admittedly often difficult if not impossible to replace. That being said, my four-year-old son loves the HMNH, so at the very least, it’s not terrifying for all small children.
http://mehanjayasuriya.com mehan

Via this blog post (http://www.ulrikagood.com/2011/04/lion-of-gripshoms-castle.html), I stumbled upon a Swedish Facebook fan page for the lion, which contains some A+ photoshops: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lejonet-p%C3%A5-Gripsholms-Slott/113607498385

Best one, IMO: http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_mR5m79UlcZE/S8CxZxNx8XI/AAAAAAAAEPM/Z-X1iop-ELU/s1600/24216_109722122380126_100000270168981_188640_6634081_n.jpg
KBert

Oh, that all lions look so adorably goofy.
That absolutely _made_ my day!
- Brainspore
  
  Oh, that all lions look so adorably goofy.
  
  More “Pluto” than “Goofy,” if you ask me.
http://darylfritz.com Daryl Fritz

Is the sign the exhibit?
pauldrye

Though a quick look at Charles XII himself suggests where the lion taxidermist may have been coming from:

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File:Karl_XII_1706.jpg

I said *more forehead* peon!
zuludaddy

Hey, is that a pangolin tail next to the sign? Pangolins are cool. With or without fezzes.
styrofoam

http://static02.mediaite.com/geekosystem/uploads/2011/04/doofy-lion-side.png
http://QuixoticJedi.com niceguyted

Did nobody read the article? The crappy lion taxidermy job was just an example – not what was actually on display. Maggie’s trying to find out if anybody knows what exactly was on display and taken down.
styrofoam

No, maggie’s trying to find out who put that sign on display, which was the entirety of the art installation.
haineux

I am going to bet 500 quatloos on David Hildebrand Wilson of the Museum of Jurassic Technology.
haineux

By the way, the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoölogy is so outstanding you should fly to Boston just to visit it.
- jere7my
  
  By the way, the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoölogy is so outstanding you should fly to Boston just to visit it.
  
  Heck yeah! The MCZ is one of my favorite spots in the Greater Boston Area. Pangolins, platypus skeletons, pink fairy armadillos, the Blaschka glass flowers exhibit…good stuff. I recognized it as soon as I saw the display case.
  
  If Xeni wants to know what inspired the sign, my guess is one of the aye-ayes. One of them is frickin’ terrifying.
Bucket

I’ve been told that bears can’t snarl and bare their teeth the way they’re usually presented when stuffed.

I’m honestly not sure if this is actually true or not, though. I make it a point to avoid provoking bears whenever possible.
http://nawel.tumblr.com Nawel

So that lion image is REAL? Well, after looking at the side photo someone posted, yep, it seems the taxidermist had only seen lions on heraldica…
Elizabeth Schechter

Oh dear GOD! To heck with being terrifying to small children, that thing scared ME!

Kill it! Kill it with a stick!
http://disqus.com/Kimmoth/ Kimmo

PMSL at the taxidermist…

I bet the teeth were as crazy wrong in 1731 as they are today.

And the eyes, they will haunt me
Lobster

It’s unethical to censor science just because it might scare little children.

However I’m pretty sure there are other reasons to revise that one…
http://profiles.google.com/bluemagruder Blue Magruder

That delightful sign was placed in an
empty space (nothing actually removed) next to the tail of the pangolin — as
part of the Harvard Museum of Natural History’s 2011 Bizarre
Animals event, which drew
over 700 to the museum for an extraordinary evening of innovative art
installations, performances, video..and more. That sign was one of many
placed throughout the galleries for just that one evening, as part of an installation by New York-based
poet Jen Bervin and the Woodberry Poetry Room at
Harvard (Christina Davis, curator). You can still see the pangolin and 500 other taxidermied animals at the museum, but no poet’s signs. Visit online at http://www.hmnh.harvard.edu.
J West

You can see some Flickr photos of the event here…

https://secure.flickr.com/photos/csdavis/sets/72157626335833539/
planaplagiarism

what’s a lion?