I do a lot of research reading and searching for stories and images of climate change and it’s affect on nature and human life. Some things I’d like to make work about are difficult to translate into an image, such as coral bleaching and loss of biodiversity.
Yet there are some subjects which recur; fire and flood are so prevalent I have been thinking about painting it so often or whether I can research harder for other subjects. This is not because I don’t think they deserve representation, I’m coming from an artistic point of view in terms of the overall coverage of issues I’d like to achieve within the project.
This last week however has been extraordinary in the amount of fires throughout Europe and I have realised that I need to paint the true picture- paint as many of these as possible. I have five in progress at the moment covering Spain, Portugal, France, UK and Morocco with more to come.
I’d like to point out that despite my passive analytical voice in these posts that I am incredibly angry and upset about the effects of climate change; there is no doubt it affects the poorest in the world exponentially and the richest are the biggest cause. Business carelessly careers ahead in the name of profit, destroying habitats (today Sizewell C approved which is to be built on an actual nature reserve) and continuing practices which pollute the air, waterways and the sea. I believe our attempts as individuals to change just aren’t enough and it has to now come from a governmental level worldwide in order to stop global warming.
Reading as much as I do is overwhelming at times and I have to have periods of switching off from thinking about it, but when I do I want to start a revolt!