Endangered Species
My work is always inspired by the natural world and often the animals that inhabit this. Recently I was looking for new inspirations for my paintings and decided I needed a new direction within my work. This lead me to looking at animals that are currently at risk of going extinct, mostly due to our acts as humans. My art is always something I try to use as a tool to raise awareness about climate change and to help provoke action in people.
Due to this my latest collection of work is based around animals that are currently at risk. I decided to start this project with the largest animal ever known to live on this planet, and in my opinion one of the most fascinating and majestic. Lets start with a few incredible facts… we all know that the blue whale is the largest animal to have ever lived on earth but let’s put that into some figures. The blue whale can weigh as much as 200 tons which is approximately 33 elephants. It has a heart the size of a Volkswagen Beetle and it’s stomach can hold one ton of krill.
The population of blue whales were depleted dramatically in the time of commercial whaling, almost to the point of extinction. Today blue whales are protected under the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act… but these animals still face risks. Blue whales are constantly facing threats from vessel strikes, entanglement, plastic pollution and of course the long term effects of climate change.
It’s shocking to think that if all these factors are effecting the largest animal on our planet then how much are they effecting every other species? Whales are a vital part of our oceans eco-system so if they are at risk it means our entire oceans are too. In order to maintain a healthy marine life we need whales to regulate the food flow of the ocean. By simply looking at the blue whales eating habits we can see that they consume 40 million krill in one day, which means the consequences would be incredible high if these incredible animals were to go extinct. So imagine the impact on marine life if other whale species where to go extinct too.
Through this project I will be highlighting the animals that need our help the most, pointing out why they are endangered, why our planet needs them and most importantly what we can do to protect them. This series starts will ‘10,000’ this piece is named that as it is estimated that there are only 10,000 blue whales left in existence today with all of these at risk. Each animal in this series will be named after how many of them are left in existence to highlight how at risk they are.
If you like ‘10,000’ you can purchase him here where 20% of the profits will go towards Surfers against Sewage and the incredible work they are doing to protect our oceans.