So I’m traveling along this ancient sea bed with my mule Polly. And I’m gathering up all these amazing interviews – folks telling me what they know about this vanished sea. Only one thing was missing.
![The Prairie-eye-view of Polly taking a snack break on her voyage across America.](https://lostseaexpedition.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/IMG_2132.jpg)
What did these critters look like? Sure, I heard that a plesiosaur looked, “like a snake drawn through the shell of a turtle.” But what the hell does that look like?
Enter friend and folk artist Charlie Frye. Charlie agreed to illustrate the Lost Sea Expedition TV series for me. I sketched out what I had in mind and over the next months, Charlie produced the 30-plus paintings.
They’re amazing. And they’re big. Some of these painting are over 3′ tall.
![Folk artist Charlie Frye and me the day I picked up the paintings for the Lost Sea Expedition series. Propped up next to us, can get a sense of how large some of them are. Yeah, Charlie's a pretty big dude.](https://lostseaexpedition.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/IMG_5146.jpg)
Charlie’s painting helped us make the jump from prairie to underwater world. He brought the sharks and clams and swimming creatures alive in a part of America that most folks associate with buffalo grass and tumbleweeds.
![A Charlie Frye painting of the Lost Sea.](https://lostseaexpedition.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/4_underwater_scene-1-1024x573.jpg)
After Charlie delivered the paintings (on time and budget, thanks Charlie) the paintings were digitized and incorporated in to the TV series.
Charlie put a tremendous effort in to painting these fantastic illustrations. They give the Lost Sea Expedition that hand crafted feel I wanted. I mean, hey, this is a series about a guy (me) traveling across America in a home made wagon. We can’t have cheesy clip art. We need paintings on boards!
And now we’ve got ’em.
Thanks Charlie and Susan of Frye Art Studio.