Elephant Parade Tour Preview

Being an artist is usually a solitary pursuit, but with the chance to meet some fellow artists, and see the public enjoying our work, I put down my brushes yesterday to go along to the Elephant Parade Tour preview at Kings Cross Station in London. The Intu Elephant Parade Tour will be launched at IntuWatford shopping centre on Monday 22nd July, but this was a chance for everyone to get a sneak preview of 13 of the herd.

It was lovely to see the elephants catching the eye of travellers passing through Kings Cross on a busy Tuesday. My elephant 'The Butterfly Effect' was waiting patiently by platform 9, with her 'trunk' all packed waiting for the Watford express!

 

The elephant tour will visit 14 Intu venues over a period of 375 days, with a herd of 100 new elephants in total. Each venue will host a family of elephants from the herd, which will include some designed and painted by local young people who have won school competitions to make their designs become a reality. All school designs will be on view digitally on a big screen in the venues.

 

True to being billed 'the people's parade' anyone wanting the chance to see their own design displayed digitally on the tour, can participate via the Elephant tour website.

 

 

Two young people taking the chance for a photo opportunity

 before 'The Butterfly Effect' catches the train!

 

The UK Elephant Parade Tour aims to raises funds for The Asian Elephant Foundation, an international conservation charity whose aim is to raise greater global awareness of Asian elephant conservation and to support projects and organisations that are dedicated to improving the well-being and conservation of the Asian elephant.

The Elephant Parade concept has made it possible to generate funds for projects varying from elephant hospitals and restoration of vital corridors of land to lobbying governments and research. To date, many Asian elephants have been saved and cured, but there are still thousands more that need our support. Please visit The Asian Elephant Foundation website for more information on the work being done for Asian elephants.

 

 

Elephants attracting attention at the Kings Cross station preview.

Elephant 'The Butterfly Effect'

It's great fun painting the coat of many colours for my elephant 'The Butterfly Effect' which I've nicknamed 'Kali' .......short for Kaleidoscope, which is the collective noun for a group of butterflies. Could there be a more beautiful or appropriate collective noun for any creature?

 

The Elephant has landed!

I'm thrilled to have been commissioned to paint another elephant for the Elephant Parade .This year it's for their first ever UK Tour in partnership with Intu and supported by Elephant Communications

The Elephant Parade hope to reach over half the UK's population with their 'People's Parade', taking their herd of 100 elephants showing designs created by artists, young artists, designers and celebrities to 13 locations. The tour will be launched on the 17th July at a secret location, then starting on 21st July for 4 weeks at IntuWatford, will travel the country including venues at Glasgow, Manchester, Cardiff and Nottingham.

The ParadeTour will for the first time include an educational programme aimed at schools, and will be running competitions to find the best young artists creating their elephant designs. Whilst raising awareness about the plight of endangered Asian elephants, thousands of designs produced by young people, will be
enjoyed digitally on big screens at the tour venues with winning designs being recreated on elephants that will join the herds locally.

My design called 'The Butterfly Effect' is inspired by the chaos theory that states that a small change in one place can result in a larger impact somewhere else.
I hope it highlights the importance of each individual making an effort to help the cause of elephant
conservation, however small ...  because like the gentle flutter of a wing, even tiny events can cause ripples that have major impact and can lead to significant change.
The selections of butterflies are native to both Europe and Asia, indicating that elephant conservation is an issue which transcends national boundaries. On a purely visual level the colourful palette and beautiful butterflies are joyous and appeal to the child in us all.

I'll be posting regular updates of my progress on twitter at   ArtistJVC

Gorilla swinging his way to the English Riviera

My gorilla 'Five minutes to midnight' for Great Gorillas will be swinging his way down to the English Riviera very soon.

 

The trail runs from 3rd August until 13th Oct and will include the wonderful miniature version of the trail at Babbacombe Model Village

 

 

There will also be a spectacular Gorilla Flotilla along the coast on 23rd July which I hope to get along to and meet everyone from the hard working Great Gorillas team and my kind sponsors Wollen Michelmore.

Really looking forward to the summer, I'm sure Great Gorillas will be hugely popular and hopefully raise lots of funds for the brilliant gorilla conservation work of Paignton Zoo

Great Gorillas update

Managing Partner Chris Hart, from my Gorilla's sponsor Wollen Michelmore dropped in to the studio to see work in progress on Five Minutes to Midnight

 

A great fun addition to the event, Great Gorillas have just announced that Babbacombe Model Village will feature a miniature trail of the gorillas in their gardens during the summer as well.

 

 

I was also very pleased to learn that Five Minutes to Midnight has been chosen as one of the designs from Great Gorillas to be produced as a miniature ceramic figurine. He will be available locally and from the Wild in Art web shop when the trail goes out in August.

 

Great Gorillas

From  Wild in Art comes another wonderful public art project which supports endangered animals.

Great Gorillas is organised to celebrate the 90th birthday of Paignton Zoo . Funds raised by the sale of the gorilla sculptures will go to support wildlife conservation including the Cross Rivers Gorilla Project.
The gorilla sculptures will form a trail around Exeter and the English Riviera for 10 weeks starting on Aug 3rd.

My design 'Five Minutes to Midnight' aka Smiley has kindly been sponsored by the South Devon Law Firm Wollen Michelmore

The concept for the design is inspired by the saying 'Five minutes to Midnight' from the symbolic Doomsday clock which heralds impending disaster.....in this case the urgency to conserve the endangered Western Lowland Gorilla. It incorporates a variety of clock faces showing the times as five minutes to midnight. The smiley face watch with no hands symbolises hope and action!

Watch this space for work in progress pics and news updates about the project.

Support the Elephant Family campaign

I've really enjoyed creating designs for the Elephant Parade sculptures over the past 3 years and hope to work with them again in the future. I'm particularly pleased that money raised from the parades goes to support the work of the Elephant Family charity to save Asian elephants.

          'Mosha the world at your feet'
which I painted for the Copenhagen Elephant Parade


The Elephant Family help the endangered Asian elephant in a number of ways including preserving the natural habitat of the elephant. Sadly 13 elephant have been killed on railway lines in India in the past fortnight alone and today the charity asked for people to sign a letter to the Indian Railways Minister, to support the call to put speed restrictions on the railways going through elephant habitat.

If you would like to support this cause or help Asian Elephants in other ways please go to
/http://www.elephantfamily.org/what-we-do/campaigns/railways/