No Time to Waste.
Eco-Art Competition 2021.

Calling all artists ages 5-22. Use your creativity to help sustain our world!

*Submissions received must be in English

* Due to U.S. regulations, cash prizes awarded outside of the United States are subject to review and may not be eligible for cash award.

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Pass It On
By Grace Swenson
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2021 - Division III (Ages 14-18)

Throughout our history, each generation has passed a more environmentally-corrupt world to the next, and it’s evidently produced an unbearable responsibility. This concept is reflected in my piece: From left to right, each hand represents a generation passing a worsened Earth off to the next, and the overall composition embodies years of gradual yet apparent pollution in the environment. The hand on the left personifies the initial state of Earth’s bursting biodiversity. Trees touched the clouds, ocean waters swelled without pollution, and not a hint of smog tainted the skies. As this ethereal world progressed over centuries, my piece reflects how we have slowly, then rapidly, crippled the environment; trees are cleared like amputated limbs, factories sprout in their place spewing with toxicity, and birds solemnly fill power lines instead of the sky. On the far right of my composition, the natural state of the environment has become so devastating, Earth is metaphorically depicted as an ignited bomb gravely waiting for its life to run out of time. I hope, “Pass It On,” conveys to audiences the chronological cruelty inflicted on the environment for years. More than that, I encourage viewers to understand that Earth can be revived to its former health, as portrayed on the left side of my piece, if and only if the unrelenting denial ends, citizens change their harmful habits, and legislators enact environmentally-friendly policies. Alternatively, the right side of my composition stresses the urgency of the climate crisis; there truly is no time to waste. It’s time to fuel ourselves with passion instead of carbon monoxide, empathy instead of selfishness, and solutions instead of excuses. Let’s make the next Earth our children and grandchildren inherit one with an unlit fuse and without an overbearing responsibility written in fine print. Pass it on.