It’s hard to disprove a negative, and local artist Eugene Parnell couches his show “Bigfoot Is Probably Real” with uncertainty and Northwest myth. In fact, he invites you to provide the evidence that Sasquatch may yet roam the forest. Oversized, strap-on wooden feet, like giant sandals, allow visitors to lay fresh tracks on an earthen bed on the gallery floor. An audio station and note-card testimonials describe Bigfoot sightings, whether real or imaginary. There’s even a fright room, where terrifying encounters may or may not take place. A sculptor and taxidermist, Parnell practices what’s sometimes called, with tongue in cheek, cryptozoology—the science of creatures that never existed, but should have. Yet he’s also a serious folklorist, a curator of tall tales we’d like to be true. The facts and the forensics may not be true, but that’s because we don’t want conclusive proof. Mythology should remain murky, like a distant shaggy figure glimpsed in the woods. BRIAN MILLER

Mondays-Fridays, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Starts: Dec. 7. Continues through Dec. 31, 2009