FAB [Friends of Art Balfron], who run Balfon ArtWorks classes, have been asked to take part in an exciting charity Public Art event called
Jungle City in Edinburgh later this summer. We were approached by Jane Robertson of Easyspace, who are sponsoring the children from ArtWorks to decorate a life-sized sculpture of a Hornbill bird.
The Hornbill is endangered due to loss of its natural habitat in South-East Asia. The Elephant Family is the charity behind the Jungle City project and our decorated Hornbill will be one of 150 Sculptures to be revealed on the 16th August in the Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. The sculptures will then be placed around the streets of Edinburgh and the public will be able to follow trails and track or 'collect' all the animals. As well as our Hornbill, there will be elephants, tigers, crocodiles and orangatans to spot. The project hopes to increase awareness of the animals plight and raise money for The Elephant Family charity by auctioning off the sculptures later in the year.
This is a really exciting project to be a part of and if it wasn't exciting enough STV came to film us designing the Hornbill. We took the interiors of Alexander 'Greek' Thomson as our inspiration for our design. 'Greek' Thomson, one of Balfron's most famous sons, was an eminent Scottish architect in the mid-nineteenth century. He drew his inspiration from Greek, Egyptian and Islamic influences, so it seemed fitting to use his global inspired designs for our Hornbill.
We'll post more on this as the project progresses, for more information on the project:
http://www.elephantfamily.org/
http://www.jungle-city.org/
http://www.easyspace.com/elephant_campaign/jungle-city
a detail from Greek Thomson's wall decoration
design detail from a floor tile
Fleur-de-lis inspired wall decoration
bringing two designs together
taking inspiration
The crew!!
The girls loving the Hornbill...
...against the Campsie Hills!
