Finch

 

Pollinating

I tried to get some shots of a bumble bee collecting nectar from these bluebells, some of them were more clear than others. The bee is visible in the centre of these images, if you look closely. I have taken these photographs with a film SLR, which can be difficult sometimes as I didn’t know if the bee would be clear. I’m still happy with the outcome, just glad I took a lot!

Wild Flowers

The second photograph is to encourage people to work with their local councils to keep green spaces for bees. Bees thrive on flowering weeds and flowers, and so far they have been in decline since the end of World War II as a result of intense farming and pesticides. This is a wild flower space in my local park, Waterloo Park in Cardiff, Roath.
The first photograph was candid as I found inspiration in the colours that fell to the ground from the cherry blossom tree.

Fragility

These photographs illustrate the fragility of nature.
(No bees were harmed during my project, the bee was a found specimen and had died before it was found.)

Wenallt

These are photographs from the Wenallt woods in Cardiff.

Degrade

These are part of a series of photographs I have done for this project. The degrading element is here too, and I’m really happy with the way the colours developed.

Almond Trees

This is an image of dead almond trees that I found in a newspaper. The almond trees are dead because of a draught that’s been happening recently. Almond trees are a prime example of mass monoculture, and there are so many of them that bee hives are trucked in for the season just to pollinate them, or people are paid to pollinate them by hand with a tiny paintbrush.

Dead Tulips

These are a couple of watercolours of dead tulips. Once again, here I wanted to paint them as dead to illustrate the decay of bee’s extinction.

Final Prints

These are my final prints in the collection. The first is of a dying bluebell, and the second is dead tulip petals. I wanted them to be decaying as I wanted to re-iterate the damage that bee’s extinction could have on the world.

Barberini Bees

In Rome, Italy, the Barberini bees can be seen everywhere. This is because of a very wealthy, noble family that rose to prominence in the 17th century. Their coat of arms was three bees, to symbolise their royal status. Bees have always been the epitome of royalty and importance.