In the TARGET! series, Zerden grapples with the troubling issue of elephant poaching. Each and every year, around 20,000 elephants are killed by illegal poachers, primarily for their tusks. That’s 55 elephants a day, 1,666 elephants a month, 5,000 a quarter, 20,000 a year, each and every year. At this rate, we may all live to see the extinction of these incredible animals. In her paintings, Zerden painstakingly hand-paints each individual elephant head, paying homage to the lives of each animal senselessly cut short by the pursuit of ivory.
“Target! 5000” 40 x 40 in. Acrylic on canvas. AVAILABLE.
Every quarter of every year (yes every 3 months) approximately 5000 elephants are poached, killed, primarily for their tusks. It’s amazingly sad that even with widespread publicity around poaching, 20,000 of these amazing animals are still hunted each and every year. “Target! 5000” was created by hand-painting 5000 individual elephant heads, each one a physical reminder of the precious lives lost in the pursuit of ivory.
”Target! Going, going, gone…”. 24 x 12 inch Acrylic on deep-set canvas. AVAILABLE
“Target! 1666” 16 x 16 Acrylic on canvas. AVAILABLE.
On Target! 1666, Zerden has painted 1,666 elephant heads, representing the number of elephants killed by poachers each and every month. In addition, the colors of each circle represent the flags of the numerous countries where elephants naturally reside, most of which are trying desperately to curb the destruction caused by illegal poaching.