Title: A Legacy Extinguished
This sculpture, a life-size replica of a less-than-a-year-old calf that is the focus of Project SculptShore, tells the story of the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale and the part we as humans have in this species' legacy. Snow Cone and her calf have successfully reached thepublic’s hearts with their stories of survival and hope through the recent documentary, The Last of the Right Whales.
Project SculptShore is using art to empower communities through education focusing on the achievable and innovative solutions to the three main issues: ocean plastics, ship strikes, and entanglement. Project SculptShore's first migration has taken him to 14 events across the Maritimes with local cleanup organizations, communities, and individuals having filled the whale with over 1 TONNE of garbage, removing hundreds of thousands of pieces of debris from the habitat of this critically endangered whale species.
Project SculptShore's concept was to create a fun and positive way of engaging people in direct action with the shoreline cleanups being on the very same Maritime shores that Snow Cone and her calf were making their way towards. Though created to bring a new positive voice of hope, we have decided that given the recent tragic end of this story, we want to use this platform as a chance to hold a vigil for our right whale calf and for Snow Cone, who has again been entangled, this time critically and will not likely last the month according to scientists. Her calf has not been seen since April. Snow Cone (#3650) is unfortunately only one of many North Atlantic right whales that are suffering, and that is why it is so important to support action and innovative solutions to protect the North Atlantic right whales so that they have the opportunity to recover.
So with this year's theme being Legacies, we have named our piece "A Legacy Extinguished". This mobile art-to-action installation and conservation initiative has been created and organized by Elizabeth Wile and Eveline Hipson in coordination with the sculpture’s artists from BernArt Maze and shoreline cleanup organizers from Scotian Shores and The Cleanup Project
Contributors:
Elizabeth Wile and Eveline Hipson met at the Canadian Conservation Corps, a program run by the Canadian Wildlife Federation. Project SculptShore started as their Stage 3 project with the CCC but has grown into a 14 event art, education, and direct action initiative in their first of many migrations across the Maritimes. The design and building of the life-size North Atlantic right whale sculpture was by the BernArt Maze artists Jerret Phillips, Nicole and Bern Krebes. With help from Rising Youth, Youth Harbor, Canadian Wildlife Federation, and Scotian Shores this project has been making a huge splash as it has removed over 1 tonne of debris so far this summer.
