We all love David Attenborough, don’t we?
We all Love David Attenborough, don’t we?
Over Christmas 2020, I put together an advent box for the homeless. It made me think about being homeless on a daily basis and what that might mean, from brushing your teeth to getting a job, so I tried to be both practical and frivolous in what I put in the box.
Art is also one of the things I concentrate on daily and somewhere along the lines the realisation hit me as to why I feel compelled to paint animals especially the endangered…
They cannot ask for help. A home gives us stability, it enables us to thrive and multiply; feel loved and safe. To lose all the aforementioned is so detrimental and can take years to recover physically and mentally. We routinely and devastatingly make the creatures who share this planet with us homeless, and increasingly to the point of extinction. Literally wiping out an entire species!
We all love David Attenborough, don’t we? At 94 he is still engaging us with the natural world around us, but now he has a more serious and urgent message and asks that we all change our habits now, to safeguard our future.
How much do we take action though, it has been proven that as human beings we are naturally optimistic and will lean towards hope rather than doom but hope without action is just a wish?
If you were asked what your ideal future looked like what would you see?
I was asked just that when a friend sent me a link, a call to action from David Attenborough and WWF for the creative arts to come together and reimagine our future, inspired by A Life on our Planet film with David Attenborough. Despite the challenges of genre, size and medium none of which were my norm, I did sketch and colour an image of a town that I would like to envision for the future.
I wrote notes below the image, to explain my thought process: Here it is in more detail:
Call out to creatives from David Attenborough
It has to start with the money machine. If banks stopped supporting businesses with a high detrimental footprint on the environment, those businesses would have to reimagine their future just like we have to. More than that, banks could choose to favourably support companies that aid our planets recovery: Image: The Green Bank: Banking on a future
Designers are ingenious and can easily rise to the challenge of water irrigation systems, solar panels and the like in designs to harvest the sun and rain, so preserving and reusing our natural resources as well as our waste. We need to say yes to these designs, doing the same thing might be the norm but should no longer be acceptable. Image: Building & road design and materials:
Re-use has to be a fashionable mantra for everything from clothes to compost. Independent business’ flourish as a result, with handmade products. The focus on quality rather than quantity; creativity is encouraged and soars. (Everybody is creative we are just taught to ignore ideas in our schooling system, be academic not a dreamer!) Food consumption changes to a more plant based seasonal diet allotments and greenhouses bring communities together and educate the young. So many benefits come about as a result of a re-use Mantra. Children are supported to be imaginative and as a result, we become a happier, healthier and a more productive society. Image: Public bins for recycling and compost. Green houses allotments, independent stall holders.
An affordable public transport system that is powered by Green energy and prides itself on low noise pollution and emissions. Our communities would be happier more connected and we would have less need for a car each. Image: Public transport
Regular daily exercise needs to be part of our daily lives. I don’t mean going to the gym necessarily; just a generation ago we used to walk more, run for busses, take the stairs etc so my feeling was if people felt safe in dedicated lanes for bikes, scooters, roller-skating and the like, more would be encouraged to get out into the open, improving general health. Image: Active Lanes
Hedge rows and flower verges will quickly encourage insect and bird life, resulting in more bird song which we all enjoyed this summer so much. Animals bridges help to minimise the devastation we cause when we build and Fruit tress for public consumption, helping the homeless and less fortunate of our society. Image: All green space in towns host wild flowers: Animal bridge, one man made the other an Elephant: The Elephant bridge was inspired by what struck me about the scenes from the Fires in Australia. There were images of animals helping other different animals to safety. As well as other videos of Elephants helping man when thought to be in trouble and drowning. Nature has a unique way of bonding if we let it.
sentient beings with memories love and compassion
Fires in Australia
I believe that we all need to dream a little bigger and brighter about our future prospects and what can be achieved. With love, we can work together, act on those dreams and everything else will fall into place. Looking forward to new beginnings…I would love to hear your ideas?
Attenboroughfilm.com @wwf-uk
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