Animal Copyright Foundation

Look up Gregory Colbert's photographic journey and exhibition “Ashes and Snow” - I am sure you will be as touched by the fantastic imagery and vision of this great photographer, film maker and animal rights campaigner.

Since 1992 Colbert has collaborated with more than 40 species around the world to create a 21st-century bestiary. These images attempt to express the world not only through human eyes, but also through the eyes of other animals.

The photographic artworks of Gregory Colbert explore the poetic sensibilities of animals in their natural habitat as they interact with human beings. No longer shown as merely a member of the family of man, humans are seen as a member of the family of animals.

“I hope to see the world through the eyes of a whale, an elephant, a manatee, a meerkat, a cheetah. Being amazed by nature in all its forms is the lifeblood of Ashes and Snow. I have tried to leave the windows and doors open so that others can enter and feel that same amazement that I felt during each work’s creation."

“I believe the Australian Aboriginals were exploring the same enchantments when they painted animals; they were not interested in merely painting the contours of their bodies. They focused equally on the animal’s interior dream life. The cave paintings of the San from the Kalahari Desert in Africa and the art of other indigenous tribes around the world also demonstrate their ability to look from the inside out. When I started Ashes and Snow in 1992, I set out to explore the relationship between man and animals from the inside out.”
- Gregory Colbert, describing Ashes and Snow as a shared work

Colbert has started up a controversial initiative to start the “Animal Copyright Foundation”, which will aim to collect 1 percent of royalties from companies using images of animals in their ads and distribute these funds to conservation projects around the world. He believes this could become the largest environmental fund in the world. Colbert suggests we should renegotiate our contract with nature. It is common practice to compensate people for fair use of their images in advertising but this has not been the case for nature and animals.

Watch an amazing clip of Ashes and Snow;



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Flamingoes Facing Loss of Breeding Grounds

Not only are wild bird populations having to cope with the strain of bird flu, our excessive demands are rapidly taking over their habitats.

One of nature's most spectacular sights - millions of pink flamingos migrating between the Rift Valley's alkaline lakes - is in danger of disappearing forever, according to conservationists.

Tata Chemicals, part of the giant Tata industrial group in India, plans to construct a soda-ash plant on Lake Natron in northern Tanzania, the most important breeding spot for the endangered lesser flamingo. Each summer 500,000 of the birds, three-quarters of the world's breeding population, fly to the lake to nest.

Chris Magin, the RSPB's officer for Africa, said that the development could leave the lesser flamingo - classified as a "near-threatened species" on the World Conservation Union red list - facing extinction.

(read more)

It's Snowing in South America

Not only are the floods increasing and the droughts become harsher around the world... now it has even snowed in Argentina's capital Buenos Aires!

"Despite all my years, this is the first time I've ever seen snow in Buenos Aires," 82-year-old Juana Benitez was quoted as saying by the Associated Press news agency.

Temperatures plunged to -22C (-8F) in parts of Argentina's province of Rio Negro, while snow fell on Buenos Aires for several hours on Monday.

This is the first sight of snow in the capital since 1918.

Global warming and global freezing...

(source)