The Canaries & Elephants series references the sayings: The-Canary-In-The-Coal-Mine and The-Elephant-In-The-Room. Each piece is a warning regarding environmental issues that are the NEXT ‘canaries-in-the-coal-mine’ for our planet, and to acknowledge, remove & cleanup after ‘the-elephants-in-the-room’.
ROUND-UP, is about our relationship to food, how it’s produced, ‘what’s for dinner’ for most Americans, and what it is doing to our health.
The coke bottle and corncob reference the Red Cross, the original protection symbol declared at the 1864 Geneva Convention. Wheat & corn are grown as subsidized monocultures in the US. Monocultures lead to uncontrollable attacks from insects unless pesticides are used. Therefore deformities & extinctions for many plants and animals occur. A ‘monoculture’ in the food we eat is also making the ecosystem of our bodies sick, requiring more and more drug intervention. Corn is also at the heart of the GMO controversy and our farmers’ inability to own seed. The black rim represents petroleum based fertilizers & shipping which are depleting & poisoning our soil, water & air.
In Greek mythology the Rod of Asclepius is a serpent-entwined rod wielded by the Greek god Asclepius a deity associated with healing and medicine. Here the ‘rod’ is represented as a hypodermic for the insulin bottle, hanging at right, that 25.8 million US Americans of every age are now dependent upon. This is due in large part because of cheap corn based, sugar infused, highly refined wheat flour and preserved products. And, sadly, its use for self medication.
Since corn is highly subsidized food corporations have found ways to put it in everything possible to dilute real food and increase their profits. Processed, packaged factory made food is cheaper to produce and lasts longer on the shelf.
Bee colonies are also dying off at alarming rates all over the world due to pesticide use, factory-farming practices. Without bees we cannot pollinate our crops in order to grow the real food we need to eat.
Tyson is one of the largest CAFOS – Confined Animal Feeding Operations. Bayer, Dow, Monsanto and Dupont - all corporations in the food for profit business.
You can vote to change this system three times a day! Buy from companies that treat workers, animals and the environment with respect. Start the Great Turning!
I believe in nature, its beauty, interconnections and inspiration. I believe it can be a guide by its responses to our actions.
I am a native Californian and feel a strong kinship with her plants, animals and geology, both in wild places and where I've lived since 1971 in East Oakland. I believe in the power of art, democracy and people’s basic need to cooperate. I do not believe that Profit (a BIG ELEPHANT) over life is a guide that brings us in balance with nature.
Our bodies, the earth and all life on it are primarily composed of water and “clay”. Clay has a memory. It records your fingerprints and all the ways you held it in your hands. Our earth has a memory and responds to our manipulations. My work in clay draws from the knowledge that everything…food, home, clothes, tools, toys all come from the ‘clay’ of the earth and the hope that we will remember to grow, gather & consume leaving the smallest fingerprint.
ROUND-UP, is about our relationship to food, how it’s produced, ‘what’s for dinner’ for most Americans, and what it is doing to our health.
The coke bottle and corncob reference the Red Cross, the original protection symbol declared at the 1864 Geneva Convention. Wheat & corn are grown as subsidized monocultures in the US. Monocultures lead to uncontrollable attacks from insects unless pesticides are used. Therefore deformities & extinctions for many plants and animals occur. A ‘monoculture’ in the food we eat is also making the ecosystem of our bodies sick, requiring more and more drug intervention. Corn is also at the heart of the GMO controversy and our farmers’ inability to own seed. The black rim represents petroleum based fertilizers & shipping which are depleting & poisoning our soil, water & air.
In Greek mythology the Rod of Asclepius is a serpent-entwined rod wielded by the Greek god Asclepius a deity associated with healing and medicine. Here the ‘rod’ is represented as a hypodermic for the insulin bottle, hanging at right, that 25.8 million US Americans of every age are now dependent upon. This is due in large part because of cheap corn based, sugar infused, highly refined wheat flour and preserved products. And, sadly, its use for self medication.
Since corn is highly subsidized food corporations have found ways to put it in everything possible to dilute real food and increase their profits. Processed, packaged factory made food is cheaper to produce and lasts longer on the shelf.
Bee colonies are also dying off at alarming rates all over the world due to pesticide use, factory-farming practices. Without bees we cannot pollinate our crops in order to grow the real food we need to eat.
Tyson is one of the largest CAFOS – Confined Animal Feeding Operations. Bayer, Dow, Monsanto and Dupont - all corporations in the food for profit business.
You can vote to change this system three times a day! Buy from companies that treat workers, animals and the environment with respect. Start the Great Turning!
I believe in nature, its beauty, interconnections and inspiration. I believe it can be a guide by its responses to our actions.
I am a native Californian and feel a strong kinship with her plants, animals and geology, both in wild places and where I've lived since 1971 in East Oakland. I believe in the power of art, democracy and people’s basic need to cooperate. I do not believe that Profit (a BIG ELEPHANT) over life is a guide that brings us in balance with nature.
Our bodies, the earth and all life on it are primarily composed of water and “clay”. Clay has a memory. It records your fingerprints and all the ways you held it in your hands. Our earth has a memory and responds to our manipulations. My work in clay draws from the knowledge that everything…food, home, clothes, tools, toys all come from the ‘clay’ of the earth and the hope that we will remember to grow, gather & consume leaving the smallest fingerprint.
© Vicki Gunter 2002-2016