Lion: I Am King

Lion - I AM KING illustrates the deep disconnect from nature that we are all confronted with in modern society.  On one hand, the lion is revered in our pop culture as a “king.”  And yet the reality of the lion is that it struggles to survive in an anthropocentric world that places one pressure after another on it.  Like many wildlife species around the world, African lions are faced with habitat loss due to an exponential “human first” land use conversion.  When you couple that with unprecedented poaching and trophy hunting, the lion population is plummeting.   

There seems to be a collective psychology that supposes that with all the problems humans face, we should not be concerned about the plight of an animal. And yet, the demise of nature and all her species is perhaps the most consequential human problem that we face.  If we could only understand that by preserving the natural world and all her species, we are preserving life for ourselves. 

Maybe putting up this artwork in a prominent place will remind those around you of this very thing.  At least that is the idea.

I am a big fan of irony in story and this is one that is tremendously bitter for me.  Why is it that we kill the things that we love the most?

Artist: Rob Whitehair

Digital mixed media: Pencil on Procreate, Photoshop, Acrylic