| Our
world is on the brink of collapse. War, famine, poverty, suppression,
preventable disease, the list goes on and on. The causes include systemic
violence, greed, ignorance, misogyny, marginalization, intolerance
and a toxic patriarchy.
Our fragility
and that of the natural world are one in the same. We don't see
ourselves as part of it all. We stupidly think that we will continue
to go on, unaffected. We are as much a part of the circle of life
on this planet as every other tiny creature. Were killing
ourselves while up to 200 species go extinct every day - out of
a million species which includes birds, mammals, insects and plants,
reptiles, amphibians, arthropods, fish, crustaceans and corals.
Forty percent of all known species facing extinction are due to
habitat loss and pesticides, a direct result of greed and expansionism.
It all comes down to money, who has it and who doesn't. We should
be ashamed by this and very afraid at the loss of any of it.
I am very lucky
to live in a beautiful part of the world. I look at the small things
around me and paint them in concert with a changing environment.
These are the most vulnerable lives. In my piece Pickerel Weed the
loon is shown rising in against a graphic background, struggling
to survive in a, soon to be, artificial landscape. These scenes
remind me of old photos or postcard from safer times, now lost as
we are way past the tipping point.
|
table>.row*3>.col*2>