P.O. Box 8874
Ketchikan, Alaska 99901
(907) 225-5954



Ray Troll is the Alaskan artist who produced the illustrations that were used to introduce the various topics of the Sea Store section of the Smithsonian's new Ocean Planet exhibition.

Ray has been variously an art instructor, a part-time slime line worker, a fishmonger, a rock 'n' roller, and a self-employed commercial artist. He has exhibited his paintings in numerous galleries throughout Alaska and the Lower 48. From his dockside studio in Ketchikan, Alaska, he continues to paint and tor create new, ever-fishy T-shirt designs.

Planet Ocean: A Story of Life, the Sea and Dancing to the Fossil Record
Written by Brad Matsen
Illustrated by Ray Troll

Roughly 600 million years ago, the first forms of complex life began swimming in the salty oceans of our planet. How life evolved from primitive, singel-celled creatures into landlubbing, consciousness-seeking humans is the fascinating story of Planet Ocean. The stars of evolution--from fishy characters like pikaia and eustheopteron to land giants like tyrannosauus and parasaurolophus--come to life in Ray Troll's "Out of the Ooze and Born to Cruise" art. And on this illustrated time-trip, writer Brad Matsen offers down-to-earth descriptions of today's scientific theories, together with firsthand accounts of sleuthing for ancient clues in some of North America's richest fossil beds.

Ray Troll's Shocking Fish Tales: Fish, Romance and Death in Pictures
Illustrations by Ray Troll
Text by Brad Matsen

Admitting you're obsessed with with fish isn't easy. Turning this obsession into words and pictures is even more difficult-- but not for Ray Troll, fish artist extraordinaire, and his sole brother, writer Brad Matsen.

In Shocking Fish Tales: Fish, Romance and Death in Pictures, Troll and Matsen share their obsession with the mysteries of the deep, the strange, the hideous and the wonderful, and of human behavior on the planet. This book combines the best of Ray Troll's often edgy, always penetrating, and colorful fish art (know to many through his T-shirt designs and fine art images with their unforgettable slogans such as "Spawn Til you Die," "Ain't No Nookie like Chinookie," and "Humpies from Hell"), with Brad Matsen's tales of fish and fisherfolk. The result is an offbeat, irreverent visual and verbal binge on the topic of fish--a powerful mix of legend, natural history, environmental observation, and true story, reminding us that the sea is still alive and kicking.

Ocean Planet Exhibition Floorplan

gene carl feldman (gene@seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov) (301) 286-9428
Judith Gradwohl, Smithsonian Institution (Curator/Ocean Planet)