Tag Archives: kalahari

Earth Day is all Wrong

Earth Day is all wrong. We seem to have everything backwards. Once a year we celebrate Earth Day; World Environment Day; World Oceans Day; National Tree Day; or World Wetlands Day. Sure, we should celebrate them because they are absolutely essential to our continued existence on this planet, but these “days” are a reminder of what is under threat, rather than a celebration. Here are just a few of the endless examples of “days” we shouldn’t need: World Rhino Day; Endangered Species Day; Lion Day; Vulture Awareness Day; World Wildlife Day; Cheetah Day.

Kalahari, Botswana, photo by Alison Nicholls

So I’ve been giving some thought to an alternative reality and some of the “days” we could hope to eliminate or celebrate at some point in the future.

Lake Kyle, Zimbabwe, photo by Alison Nicholls

Instead of Earth Hour (where we shut down all our electrical appliances and devices for an hour) wouldn’t it be great if we lived in a world where once a year we had “Power Hour”, when we’d try running all our appliances and devices at once, just for a laugh, knowing that we couldn’t overload our clean, green, renewable energy grid.

Mount Machapuchare, Nepal, photo by Nigel Nicholls

Instead of Car Free Day, we might one day live in a world where “Pollution Day” is on the calendar – not as a celebration but a remembrance of the past and less-enlightened times.

In this world we wouldn’t need any of the wildlife “days” because none of these species would be under threat from habitat loss, poaching, or human-wildlife conflict.

Lamar Valley, Yellowstone, USA, photo by Alison Nicholls

And this could go well beyond environmental issues. Wouldn’t it be great to live in a world where “Remembering ALS (MND)” or “Remembering Breast Cancer” was held, because no-one suffered from these diseases anymore.

Do you have any ideas of current “days” you’d like to abandon, or future “days” you’d really like to celebrate?
Alison
PS. Yes, for all these reasons I didn’t write this post on Earth Day, although I couldn’t help myself – I had to celebrate the Earth with some photos from my travels over the years!
www.ArtInspiredbyAfrica.com

A Lion In The Headlights!

It was late afternoon; we were approaching our campsite in Mabuasehube, in the south-west of Botswana; and a beautiful dark-maned lion was in the grass 200 yards from our campsite. As we put up our tents we kept an eye out for him, knowing that lions can be curious; but it was too hot for him to move. We knew that once the sun set, he was almost certainly going to walk along the sandy track straight through our camp, so before it got dark we moved our truck so it faced down the track towards him, hoping to keep him in view by the light of the headlights as he passed by. Sure enough, he started his deep guttural roars and gradually they got closer and louder. Eventually we knew he was just on the edge of camp, so we moved from our chairs by the fire and stood next to the vehicle. We had been in a situation like this before, but on that occasion we had retreated to our vehicle when we saw the lions; this time we hoped to hold our nerve and watch him walk by without feeling the need to hop in the vehicle. This may sound like complete craziness, but we had spent nearly 10 years living in Botswana and Zimbabwe by this stage and we had had so many encounters with wild lions in national parks and game reserves that we knew the way they normally react – sometimes curious, but definitely not seeing us as a menu item – if they did, camping in the Kalahari would not have been so high on our list of things to do!

Mabuasehube, Botswana – photo by Alison Nicholls 2002

The lion continues to come closer, completely unfazed by the headlights of our vehicle (lions are not fazed by many things), deviating for a minute to mark his territory next to our long drop toilet (appropriately), before padding straight towards us again. When he was about 10 feet in front of the vehicle we unfortunately lost our nerve and decided it was time to get in. Four of us tried to get in 2 doors (survival of the fittest) but after a little excited banter, we were all in the truck. The lion didn’t even look in our direction and continued on his magnificent parade. Once we were sure he was gone, we headed back to our chairs by the fire for a large gin & tonic!

About 20 minutes later he obviously reached the other campsite located further along the edge of the salt pan, because suddenly we saw flashlights piercing the darkness in all directions, coming together to silhouette a nonchalant big cat padding through the darkness. Experiences like this, in a true wilderness, are some of my most valued memories…

And, you guessed it, we didn’t manage to take a single photo!

Any more #WishIHadAPhotoWednesday stories out there?
Alison
www.ArtInspiredbyAfrica.com

Art Challenge Day 1 – Watercolor Landscapes

Okavango Palms, watercolor 20×16″ by Alison Nicholls

Anteating Chats in the Kalahari, watercolor 24×30″ by Alison Nicholls

Khutse Sparrow Weavers, watercolor 24×30″ by Alison Nicholls

I have been nominated to take part in a Facebook Art Challenge by my friend and fellow artist Karryl, who creates wonderful whimsical animal sculptures. Thank you, Karryl! The challenge is to post 3 images of my art every day for 5 days, each day nominating a new artist to take part in the challenge. Although this is a Facebook challenge, I decided to post the same pieces to my blog. And, like many other artists who are taking part in the challenge, I’ve decided to use these posts to show you my artistic journey, showing artwork from different years to illustrate how my style developed over time.

I really began to paint when I moved to Africa. Since childhood I’d really only been interested in drawing landscapes. Drawing is still very important for me and watercolor allowed me to combine drawing with color. Having not studied art, I had no exposure to other media, so I stuck with the only media I knew. These pieces were probably completed between 2000-2003 At the time I really wasn’t keeping good records, or taking particularly good photos of my work. And, as you can see, my watercolors were quite detailed and realistic. These were no doubt completed from photos, but already I can see the use of a limited palette of colors in each piece, a careful composition and an element of space, features which still exist in my work today.

Tomorrow, I’ll be posting the next set of images – Wildlife in Detail.

And the next artist I’d like to nominate for the challenge is Asher Jay. She visited my studio in the summer and we had a great day talking about art and conservation. You may already have seen her work. If not, watch her posts, she has some great images to share!

Until tomorrow…
Alison

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