Description
In this video, I was given special permission by the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG) to enter before opening hours and spend quiet time sketching what remains of the thylacine… skins, bones, and a haunting reminder of what we’ve lost.
In that room, drawing from these preserved pieces, it’s hard not to imagine the animal as it once was—alive, moving through the Tasmanian bush. Looking back at my sketches, there’s a strange feeling… like I was sketching a living creature, not something gone.
The thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger, was the largest known carnivorous marsupial of modern times. It had a stiff tail, a dog-like head, and distinctive dark stripes across its back. Once found across mainland Australia and Tasmania, it was driven to extinction through hunting, habitat loss, and human fear. The last thylacine is believed to have died in captivity in 1936.
This sketch becomes part of my nature journal—but it’s a bittersweet entry. One I wish could have been drawn from a living animal.
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