Maya Lin Memorial to the Environment
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 9.08
Maya Lin's name is familiar to many (ageing) Treehuggers because of her famous war memorial to Vietnam veterans in Washington, done when she was only 21 years old. She has continued to work since then (1982) with a series of other memorial sculptures. The latest, and last is planned for Earth Day 2009. Called Missing, it is a memorial to the environment and all the species and places that have "gone extinct or will most likely disappear, within our lifetime." It will be located in several different locations around the world and will include a list of names, as did the Vietnam memorial. However these will be the names of animal, bird and plant species that have become extinct.
As she says "Do the math, guys. Where do we want to be in 50 years? That's the question...the top 10 songbirds we grew up with are in a 40% to 70% decline. Our oceans are being devastated by overfishing. The landscape we grew up with has been significantly diminished. I just want to bring attention to it and give people the idea that you can do something about it." Now she is working on the Confluence Project: seven art installations along the Columbia River Basin (pictured) created to evoke the history of the Lewis and Clark Expedition and the changes it brought to the Pacific Northwest.
Another work now on display, Systematic Landscapes, is a series of three massive installations about the earth and the viewer's relationship to natural landscape. 2x4 Landscape (pictured) is a 10-foot tall wave from one angle and a hill from another. Made of 65,000 boards set on end, it can be walked around and climbed upon. :: Los Angeles Times
This would be a very moving memorial and could be an excellent opportunity for raising awareness.
In the next 50 years between 25% and 50% of some plant and animal species could be wiped out -think of the size of that memorial if we do nothing!Anything that makes people think is vital and should be applauded.
It's crucial that we address this issue now as it may already be too late for many species, but there is still time to save others. How could we ever forgive ourselves if the only reason half the world died was our own apathy. How would future generations see us? Probably with the same distain with which we regard Hitler for his acts of genocide - is what we are doing so much different? Just because it isn't human beings we are wiping from existence does that make it any less excusable?
The more we raise awareness of these pressing issues the better.
Good article.
Steve N. Lee
author of eco-blog http://www.lionsledbysheep.com
imagine, we are doing the same thing that the comet ultimately did to the dinosaurs
I read about Maya Lin's new project in the LA Times, too, great stort and a great project. Honoring extinct species in a commemorative list will help raise conciousness worldwide about what humans are doing to this Earth we call home.
Her project sparked in an idea in my imagination, too, and I have embarked on a global roll call project to compile the names of all 6.7 billion people on the Earth at this present time, list the names on a blog in cyperspcae, with the assistance of a team of volunteers all over the world, and use this list of names of humans, all of us, as another wake up call about global warming and climate change. See news here. Ms Lin's project is newsworthy and very important and I am sure it will be successful. With lots of sponsors and funding. Nice. An important wake up call.
My project, here, http://sixbillion101.blogspot.com, will not have any sponsors or funding, other than my own time and dime, but that's okay. I don't need money.
I do hope the news media takes note of my quixotic "global roll call" too one day, to help raise the alarm about the future of the human species. If we don't get climate change and global warming under control, we might end up living in polar cities in northern regions, which by then will be warm and ice-free. Google "polar cities" to see more on this.
Developing.
Notes:
Climate change website to list names of all 6.6 billion people on Earth
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Website to list 6.6 billion Earthlings in "global roll call"
PRESS RELEASE
for immediate release anytime
after April 15, 2008
Contact: Danny Bloom
Email: danbloom@gmail.com
==========================
Virtual 'global warming' museum to host new side-exhibit listing names of all 6.6 billion inhabitants of Earth, country by country, as commemorative time capsule
Volunteers needed to help compile list
It's a global roll call.
Danny Bloom wants names. Lots of names. In fact, he wants the names of all human beings alive at the present time on planet Earth as part of a public perfomrance art exhibit compiling a commemorative list of all 6.67 billion names -- what the climate activist blogger calls a "global roll call" to wake people up about the dangers we are facing in the future regarind global warming.
By compiling the list of all 6.6 billion inhabitants of Earth, Bloom
said he hopes "to highlight the fact that the issues of global warming
do not involve rich nations competing against poor nations, or
rightwing pundits against environmental activists, but rather the fact
that we are all involved in the future we are creating together, in
this day and age."
To send in your own individual name or a list of family members
and friends to the online virtual museum, Internet users are invited to send an
email to: reporter.bloom@gmail.com Those who do not wish to be included in the list may opt out by stating so in writing.
I read about Maya Lin's new project in the LA Times, too, great stort and a great project. Honoring extinct species in a commemorative list will help raise conciousness worldwide about what humans are doing to this Earth we call home.
Her project sparked in an idea in my imagination, too, and I have embarked on a global roll call project to compile the names of all 6.7 billion people on the Earth at this present time, list the names on a blog in cyperspcae, with the assistance of a team of volunteers all over the world, and use this list of names of humans, all of us, as another wake up call about global warming and climate change. See news here. Ms Lin's project is newsworthy and very important and I am sure it will be successful. With lots of sponsors and funding. Nice. An important wake up call.
My project, here, http://sixbillion101.blogspot.com, will not have any sponsors or funding, other than my own time and dime, but that's okay. I don't need money.
I do hope the news media takes note of my quixotic "global roll call" too one day, to help raise the alarm about the future of the human species. If we don't get climate change and global warming under control, we might end up living in polar cities in northern regions, which by then will be warm and ice-free. Google "polar cities" to see more on this.
Developing.
Notes:
Climate change website to list names of all 6.6 billion people on Earth
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Website to list 6.6 billion Earthlings in "global roll call"
PRESS RELEASE
for immediate release anytime
after April 15, 2008
Contact: Danny Bloom
Email: danbloom@gmail.com
==========================
Virtual 'global warming' museum to host new side-exhibit listing names of all 6.6 billion inhabitants of Earth, country by country, as commemorative time capsule
Volunteers needed to help compile list
It's a global roll call.
Danny Bloom wants names. Lots of names. In fact, he wants the names of all human beings alive at the present time on planet Earth as part of a public perfomrance art exhibit compiling a commemorative list of all 6.67 billion names -- what the climate activist blogger calls a "global roll call" to wake people up about the dangers we are facing in the future regarind global warming.
By compiling the list of all 6.6 billion inhabitants of Earth, Bloom
said he hopes "to highlight the fact that the issues of global warming
do not involve rich nations competing against poor nations, or
rightwing pundits against environmental activists, but rather the fact
that we are all involved in the future we are creating together, in
this day and age."
To send in your own individual name or a list of family members
and friends to the online virtual museum, Internet users are invited to send an
email to: reporter.bloom@gmail.com Those who do not wish to be included in the list may opt out by stating so in writing.