Endangered Species in New England 

The Blue Whale, ceramic, 16cmx21.5cm 

Project Goals:

• To use art in raising awareness of Endangered Species in New England;

• To learn about artists who work with animals as their subjects, (specifically,  Ami Vitale, Tim Christensen, Joel Sartore, Anne London, and Oaxacan Alebrijes from Mexico).

• To become acquainted with basic ceramic vocabulary;

• To learn about and find inspiration in the highly patterned art (Alebrijes) from Oaxaca, Mexico;

To form and paint a low relief ceramic tile that contains both imagery of a species of your choice and an indication of the systems around it which promote that species’ survival.

Artists and Art Culture Studied: Ami Vitale, Tim Christensen, Joel Sartore, Anne London, and Oaxacan Alebrijes from Mexico.

Reflection:

I chose the Blue Whale. The most imporant fact about the blue whale is that they are getting killed most often by fish nets. We can try to keep the blue whale alive by limiting the usage of fish nets in the world. 

I chose to do cool colors for my color scheme. I like it a lot because the colors don’t match the environment perfectly but the blues for the ocean and whale kind of match which I like. I think something I would change is to maybe go for a bolder color scheme rather than something with blue. Just to make the animal more bold and not so relative to the actual color. 

I am helping respond to the essential question because of the designs I put on my tile to show whats important to that animal. I think the water droplets and the fish net best describe the animal because the Blue Whale’s main source of food is krill, which is represented by the fish design. The Blue Whale is most commonly killed by getting stuck in fish nets which is shown by the fish net design.

Planning: