Frog pond
In the middle of Cochabamba there is this adorable natural history museum.
Enveloped in a vast wilderness, consisting of a wide array of plant life three gorgeous dogs, and is defiantly teaming with insects.
The inside of the museum there is also a beautiful divers collection of animals and insects that will activate imagination.
The natural history museum is also home to the Bolivian Amphibian Initiative. These are the lovely people I had the honor to get to work with.
In order raise awareness the vast diversity of amphibians present in Bolivia they are currently creating a frog pond which will host local species, this frog pond will be situated next to a huge white pressurized container that is home to the Telmatobios.
The Telmatobios is and endangered species of frog indigenous to Lake Titicaca. It only survives there due to the high altitude, it’s going extinct due to pollution and over fishing. Peruvians believe that making juice out of the frogs works as an aphrodisiac. Which is intriguing because when you translate the Latin name to English it means aquatic scrotum.
To accompany the frog pond I got asked to make a mural dedicated to the diversity of amphibians in Bolivia. Which is no easy thing considering the vast amount of fabulous amphibian species exist in Bolivia. Naturally the Telmatobios had to be the star but besides him there are so much more I couldn’t even imagine. The Bolivians have a lot to be proud of apparently there is also an old indicative god for frogs, sadly to say apart from that he existed there was not much more my friends in Cochabamba could tell me about him.
Of the many frogs I painted and got acquainted with this guy was by far my favorite.
The finished result turned out great an truly fits in its environment, I would strongly encourage anyone who fines themselves in the neighborhood to go have a look because its defiantly a museum that will offer some enrichment, certainly when the frog pond gets finished.
Surya de Wit - Fine Artist 