Blockbuster ‘Jurassic World’ Exhibit at Katy Mills Is Fun for All Ages

Blockbuster ‘Jurassic World’ Exhibit at Katy Mills Is Fun for All Ages

WHILE IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCES have sort of taken over event calendars these past few years, many have been much more about providing Instagram-friendly content rather than in-the-moment fun.


Jurassic World: The Exhibition is a 20,000-square-foot show erected in a tent in the parking lot of Katy Mills mall; it has previously popped up in Madrid, Paris, Seoul, Sydney and beyond. From start to finish, the hour-long walk-through production is engaging and appeals to multiple generations of patrons — regardless of whether they want to post it on social media.

“Pods” of guests can enter the tent every half-hour. The experience kicks off with a photo op, and then a short video that is played as visitors board a ferry, sail across the ocean, and arrive at the iconic Jurassic World gate.

Inside, guests come face-to-face with life-size animated dinosaurs, and are escorted from room to room by cute, young attendants with a decent knowledge of the species. Special features include sensory tables, iPads that allow guests to “see” inside dinosaur eggs, and meet-and-greets with baby dinos!

People + Places

Sarah Sudhoff (photo by Katy Anderson)

SINCE THE 1970s, Houston’s cultural scene has only grown richer and more diverse thanks to the DIY spirit of its visual artists. As an alternative to the city’s major museums (which are awesome) and commercial galleries (again, awesome), they show their work and the work of their peers in ad-hoc, cooperative, artist-run spaces — spaces that range from the traditional white cube interiors, to private bungalows, to repurposed shipping containers.

Keep Reading Show less
Art + Entertainment

Matthew Dirst (photo by Jacob Power)

FOR FANS OF early music — an often scholarly lot who aren’t afraid to wear their hearts on their sleeves — bad-boy Baroque-era painter Caravaggio certainly nailed something in his dramatic 1595 painting, “The Musicians.” (Simon Schama talks about this in his TV series The Power of Art.) One look at his masterpiece, and you feel as if you’ve stumbled upon and surprised a roomful of dewy-eyed musicians, their youthful faces swollen with melancholy, with the lutist looking like he’s about ready to burst into tears before he’s even tuned his instrument. So no, you certainly don’t need a Ph.D. to enjoy and be moved by the music of Handel, G.P. Telemann, or J.S. Bach, but a little bit of scholarship never hurt anyone. Knowing the history of this music may even deepen your appreciation of it.

Keep Reading Show less