Wikimedia Commons: Lakeview #1 oil gusher, Kern County, California, USA, after the well had partially subsided, the derrick removed, and the well surrounded by a sandbag berm. Photo by W.C. Mendenhall, US Geological Survey, 1910

The Lakeview Gusher Number One was an immense out-of-control pressurized oil well in the Midway-Sunset Oil Field in Kern County, California, resulting in what is regarded as the largest oil spill in history, lasting 18 months and releasing 9 million barrels (1.4×106 m3) of crude oil. In what was one of the largest oil reserves in America, pressure built to an extreme due to the quantity of crude oil in the area. (wikipedia)

Artist’s statement:

In my work this romantic ideal of union with the natural world conflicts with our contemporary impact on the environment. These pieces are in part responses to environmental stressors including climate change, toxic pollution, and gm crops. They also borrow from myth, art history, figures of speech and other cultural touchstones. In some pieces aspects of the human figure stand-in for ourselves and act out sometimes harrowing, sometimes humorous transformations which illustrate our current relationship with the natural world. In others, animals take on anthropomorphic qualities when they are given safety equipment to attempt to protect them from man-made environmental threats. In each case the union between man and nature is shown to be one of friction and discomfort with the disturbing implication that we too are vulnerable to being victimized by our destructive practices. (read on)

First spotted via Who Killed Bambi.

About Bob Staake:

Bob Staake (born September 26, 1957 in Los Angeles, California) is an American illustrator, cartoonist, children’s book author, and designer. He lives and works in Chatham, Massachusetts on the elbow of Cape Cod. (wikipedia)

I first came to know Bob Staake through this video, were he demonstrates how he uses a subtraction process in Photoshop 3.0 to create his illustration. Visit his official website (and discover a lot more about his art).

Previously on Skandalon : Barry Blitt, British Petroleum

“Two brown pelicans and a flock of seagulls rest on the shore of Ship Island as a boom line floats just offshore Thursday, April 29, 2010 in Gulfport, Miss. Several hundred yards of boom line has been set up on the north side of the island to try and contain the oncoming oil spill. Crews are placing the boom in different areas on Coast waterways to help protect against an approaching oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico.” (more)

The photo is related to the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion.

“Animal Logic: Photography and Installation by Richard Barnes presents a mid-career survey of the work of acclaimed New York and San Francisco-based photographer Richard Barnes. Barnes’s work looks critically at both the natural world and the ways in which we attempt to institutionalize and classify nature within museums.” (from the Cranbrook Art Museum website).

Richard Barnes statement about this series is… coming soon.

The Big Picture - Boston.com: “Earthquake in Chile” Feb. 27th, 2010. Phptp by Marco Fredes for Reuters

“At 3:34 am local time, today, February 27th, a devastating magnitude 8.8 earthquake struck Chile, one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded. According to Chilean President-elect Sebastian Pinera, at least 120 people are known to have been killed so far. The earthquake also triggered a Tsunami which is right now propagating across the Pacific Ocean, due to arrive in Hawaii in hours (around 11:00 am local time). The severity of the Tsunami is still not known, but alerts are being issued across the Pacific.” (more)

“A group of crested macaques, more accustomed to tropical rainforests in Indonesia, huddle together for warmth in Dublin Zoo in Dublin, Ireland, on Dec. 30. The primates are endangered in their own land because of hunting and the clearing of their native habitat.”