I’m delighted to have work included in ‘Animal’, @animamundigallery, (18/07 – 29/08).
‘Animal’ includes work by Sam Bassett, Paul Benney, Jim Carter, Kate Clark, Judith Nangala Crispin, Claire Curneen, Lena Dabska, Miles Cleveland Goodwin, Andrew Hardwick, Andrew Litten, Antony Micaleff, Jamie Mills, Tom Pether, Dr Martin Shaw, Tim Shaw, Oleksii Shcherbak, Kate Walters, David Kim Whittaker, Joy Wolfenden Brown, Faye Eleanor Woods.
Introduction :
“The man and the beast are one cloth.” — Cornish Proverb
Here – where memory is held in stone and sea and whispered on the wind—stories were once told of the animals who moved between worlds. These myths reflected our deeper relationship – of an inherent knowing kinship with all living beings. In ‘Cad Goddeau’, the 6th Century Welsh poet Taliesin wrote “I have been a stag, a salmon in a pool, a dog, a roebuck on the mountain..” This sentiment is shared across time and cultures where shamans, elders, and healers speak the same truth: Animals are not “other.”
Bonaparte the Pig may be right when he declared that “Four legs good, two legs bad.” Today, in the shadow of ecological collapse, a murmur of ‘older ways’ should be heard loud and clear. Our Earth is burning, drowning, breaking under weight of progress. Species vanish daily. And behind every extinction is a broken relationship. Science now supports what ancient teachings have always held: That we are not separate from the Earth. We are participants in a shared system – body, breath, and being. This is not poetic concept, It is scientific imperative. Earth is undergoing a sixth mass extinction, driven by habitat loss, climate change, and industrial exploitation. Since 1970, global wildlife populations have declined by 69% on average. When a species disappears, it tears holes in our ecosystems—and in ourselves.
“We are not separate spirits. We are one spirit walking in many bodies”— Lakota oral tradition
