4/11/2018 - ANIMALS AGAINST EXTINCTION

After being inspired by the works of the Extinction Rebellion for the very self aware approach to climate change, non violent action, and the realisitic prospect of 'prepping', I decided to create a small artistic protest of my own and exercise some of the new critical theory I had been absorbing for my dissertation around re-empowering the animal image or 'bringing in the animal'. It is easy to think of extinction as a prospect reserved for the flats of antarctica or due to deforestation in a remote part of the Amazon rainforest. It always feels very far away and to be happening somewhere else.


But there are also knock on effects in our own ecosystem. And furthermore, one of the reasons we have such an impoverished spectrum of wildlife in the UK is because historically many of our unique species such as the lynx and the European beaver were hunted to extinction by our forebears, leaving us only with noticeably the smallest, most docile members of our original ecosystem.

I had the idea of creating a small protest of some of the creatures we still see in the UK today, to bring the home front of our ecosystem onto the cause, so to speak. It is also exploring the phenomena under which the oppression which is being enacted on organic life on this planet is unique in that it is an unempowered struggle without a voice of it's own society or an ability to speak for it's own cause. Unlike the struggles of the apartheid, feminist movement, nazi germany and the innumerable list of other counts of human subjugation, the environment has no marginalised human group of which to speak it's name, as discussed by Samantha Hurn:

"While they have been ‘muted’, alienated and oppressed in many respects, groups, including women, children, the elderly, indigenous people, ‘gay’ people or people ‘of colour’ can speak for themselves when given the chance. Notwithstanding the few apes who have mastered human sign language (but who still rely on humans to interpret what they are saying), there is always going to be a need for someone to ‘speak for’ the animal persons on a political or legal stage."

By placing native woodland animals into a protest situation, with small signs and banners, they are not only seen to be self aware and motivated to avoid their current state of affairs, but also pulling together in solidarity and connection with one another towards a higher cause, which ultimately goes against their nature, for a greater good.

I decided to use two smaller animals to hold the signs initially, both in quite focused, direct ways, and then a larger fallow deer with a larger,  more expressive, colloquial banner. In my head at the time I created the narrative that the protest had been the idea of Rat and Squirrel, who enlisted the help of their larger deer friend to join them in their intervention and help them get out the larger bredth of their point.

The idea of animals clubbing together and thinking about the best way to get their point across to the stupid, hairless monkeys who were fucking the entire thing up for the rest of them, was something I found quite humorous and endearing in concept. Particularly as it is something which we must also do; go against our fundemental natures for the greater good.

My next idea was then to stage these as wheatpasted 'protests' in locations around the city. I was also very drawn to the illustrative effect of these drawings, calling interesting concepts into play around disneyfication and appropriation of the animal image, as in some ways this is what I am doing, however it is actually attempting to invert the very injustice that has already occured.