We’ve all seen viral photos while lazily scrolling through Facebook or elsewhere on the interwebs, often with rather questionable descriptions. Have you ever wondered the true stories behind them though? I have, especially when they concern my favorite topic – Mushrooms! It’s a mystery to me why fanciful stories are so often attached to these when the truth is better than fiction. Let’s start with probably one of the oldest and more well known: “A water damaged copy of Alice in Wonderland which grew fungi”.
This one has been circulating for nearly a decade, always with the same implausible story. Invariably, someone in the comments will chime in to point out these are ‘magic mushrooms’ (Psilicybin cubensis) that would never have grown naturally on a waterlogged book and thus had to have been purposefully grown....
[It] turned out to be an installation by Dr. Igor Siwanowicz, an accomplished biochemist and neuroscientist with a love for nature and macro photography. It’s also a Bible, by the way. He merely photoshopped it in post to look like a copy of Alice’s Adventure’s in Wonderland.
JewOrleans on September 2nd, 2021 at 11:39 UTC »
Pretty sure I remember this being an art piece.
NotSoMuch_IntoThis on September 2nd, 2021 at 12:11 UTC »
According to this one year old comment it was done on purpose.
Spartan2470 on September 2nd, 2021 at 13:17 UTC »
The cover of the book has been photoshopped. Here is what this installation piece by artist/photographer, Igor Siwanowicz originally looked like.
Per here: