Guardian of Amazon

Printed on Washi Paper, Analog and Digital Collage 2021
180x 181 cm in total
Our generation is the turning point where we have to take environmental issues seriously. It is frightening to think that an enormous area of forests is converting to desert, causing a rapid increase in temperature. My senior thesis expresses fear of such a future, envisioning the story of Laércio Guajajara, the leader of a guerrilla in the rainforest, and the situation of the Amazon rainforest. The group of people coming from the tribe faces a violent fight against loggers daily, and they risk their lives for the cause. From an economic perspective, the Amazon forest is rich in resources that the people can live off from the medical plants, fruits, and traditional products of the Amazon tribes without degrading what they have. Illegal logging (especially when they use industrial machines) is a huge problem that not only risks the life of the forest, but also risks the whole balance of the planet. Massive logging and converting the land to agricultural use have damaged the forest, resulting in severe wildfire damage. In 2019, 3500 square miles of the forest were lost due to the fire, and 8000 square miles more the following year. It is obvious that such a business strategy wouldn’t last long, considering they are consuming limited resources. It deserves to have the same notoriety and controversy as the oil and gas business. The animals in the drawing, except for the Boa Constructor and Hoatzin, are endangered due to the destruction of their habitats in the forest. Some species, such as the Hoatzin, are an extremely rare genus that has no other subfamily of the kind. The unique but beautiful flowers and plants specifically come from this rainforest, and in fact, we somehow profit from them already through the medium, such as foliage plants and cacao. I was inspired by the volume of Henri Rousseau and the detail of Jakuchu Ito in the creation of this work. The choice of paper is to give an identity to my culture. However, all of the motif research comes from random websites on the internet. This work also expresses the information gap between each website. If you look up endangered animals in the Amazon rainforest, perhaps you will receive different results.