???? by Anya Mielniczek @anyamielniczek ????
I got to finally meet Anya this past weekend while she was working on this mural ! She’s even cooler in person !
This wall mural is really amazing to see in person. Tt wasn’t quite complete on the weekend, so I popped back yesterday afternoon to check it out ! It’s hard to read from my photo but on the very bottom of the mural; it has some writing on the ledge. It reads as follows “2018 – 87 Elephants found in Botswana DEAD… 1 of the last safe havens 4 species.”
She explains on her account the meaning behind that inscription. After finding out the troubling news about the elephants; it affected her and it ultimately changed the vision of her original artwork. If you browse through her Instagram account you will see that she really cares about animals and the environment .. and we all should..
Much respect to Anya for bringing attention to this.. I found a news blurb online “The conservationist group also said there’s an increase in poaching in Botswana simply because that’s where the remaining elephants in the continent are. After poachers wiped out large numbers of elephants in neighboring Zambia and Angola, they’re “now turning their guns to Botswana,” Chase said.”
If you google “Botswana and Elephants” you can find more about his terrible tragedy.
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I got to get a few progress photos for this wall as well. Here is the beginning of her mural and you can see how she made all the elephants as apart of the background here.
This picture was from Saturday afternoon as well. At the top of the ladder she put her name and the year. My photo unfortunately cut that off.
That is her mixing some paint on Sunday.. she uses both paint and aerosol.
She also has a really great timelapse video on her instagram account… Again, this was apart of the Laneway Light Up Project
I found this wonderful piece by Anya Mielniczek a couple of weeks ago (2019-11-09). Thank you for the background information. Unfortunately, it looks like the word “DEAD” is now obscured, so I didn’t notice it until looking at your photographs.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/designwallah/49137930946/
Cheers.
Francis.