Sophia Paparsenos.

This piece depicts the influence of human impact on the world's environment. Global warming, extinctions and adaptations to the environment are natural for our planet. Temperatures shift, species change, it is a part of the lifecycle of our world. Humans, though, have accelerated these processes to an unnatural rate causing many of the world's climate issues, including global warming, mass extinctions, pollution, deforestation, increased wildfires, etc.

The composition of my piece depicts a deck of cards cascading downwards, being engulfed by fire. The fuel to this fire is a silhouette of a human made out of oil. The deck of cards are adorned with various protected species of animals based on the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) conservation list. This thumbnail showcases a few selected species from what would be 52 total species. The species order ranges from vulnerable-> endangered-> critically endangered, this can be seen in representation with the value on the cards themselves. For example, the hippopotamus is on the 2 of diamonds, classified as vulnerable and has a population of 125,000-148,000.

The Galapagos penguin is on the nine of clubs, classified as endangered with a population between 3,000 and 8,000. As well as the Sumatran Rhino, which is on the ace of diamonds, classified as critically endangered with a population of 40. The order of the cards; clubs, diamonds, hearts, spades, is related to the card game bridge where clubs are the lowest suit and spades are the highest.

The card deck concept is used in order to portray the idea of how humans are “playing” with nature. This showcases the severity of deaths for each species in relation to the card deck itself and to a game that can be associated with gambling. I did research on each species individually, in total 52 species to fill up an entire deck of cards. I continuously saw the same reasons for each animal's status of conservation; poaching, habitat loss, pollution, animal trade, e.g.. Each of these issues have occurred due to human intervention with nature. We as a species have accelerated the process of extinction.

The human silhouette is not of one identifiable individual, rather a faceless human made out of oil, a form of fuel. This is done to show how humans as a whole have been thefuel to these issues. The fire has been around and is natural, we are just accelerating it and the natural world pays the consequences.