14 JULY 2019 THOUGHT FOUNDATION

Elephants Biro Drawing Workshop
Thought Foundation
14 July 2019

WORKSHOP OVERVIEW

In celebration of the Elmer Parade and in conjunction with Jane's Where Did All the Animals Go? exhibition at Thought Foundation, African and Asian elephants from calves to 60 year-old matriarchs were studied in this workshop. Jane delivered a presentation about elephant facts including threats due to poaching and habitat loss. She also discussed the following statistics and ways to help elephants:

Every day approximately 50 elephants are killed by poachers – that’s about one elephant every 25 minutes. So around 11 am this morning an elephant will have been killed. There are more elephants being killed than being born which means they are literally marching towards extinction.

Here are a couple of actions you can take to help elephants:

Buy fair-trade coffee only, and better still shade-grown coffee as it requires no pesticides and is all round better for the environment
Follow organisations on SM such as Born Free who help conserve elephants. Share their posts and sign petitions
Share with friends and family what you have learnt today about elephants as well as the tragic statistics. Education is one of the keys to conservation and perhaps someone you know might want to do the following:
Help the conservationist’s with their work – adoption is a great way to help elephants, it doesn’t cost much and there are many organisations including Born Free who run elephant adoption schemes. If you can’t afford to adopt an elephant you could always donate the odd £1 here or there online

Before leaving home Jane set her alarm for 11am and while attendees were working on their drawings, the alarm rang to remind everyone that an elephant had just been killed during the first 25 minutes of the workshop.

Thought Foundation

DRAWING SELECTION

A collection of really stunning elephant drawings were created in this workshop. Alisa Richardson created an extremely beautiful and haunting portrait of an elephant calf in her effortlessly exquisite and unique drawing style, which she finished at home. Her daughter Edie's paint palette collided with the drawing to create gorgeous accidental marks which add personal symbolism to the story of her artwork.

Sarah Slater who has been attending workshops since 2017 produced a beguiling colour Biro drawing of an elephant herd and Dawn Hunter also a regular attendee made a bold and expressive portrait of a young elephant.

Elephant Calf 2019 Biro drawing Alisa Richardson