November 8th, 2010 is the official date of my Senior Show that I am required, to put on and yet, I am glad this is something I have to do. In the past, I have never been confident in my art to place in any art exhibit, even on campus. I would focus on what other people were creating and I would say, "my art is different than their's, it wouldn't fit." or "my art doesn't look as professional as their's" and never even placed an application into the galleries. Now that I am required, I have no choice but to step on that fear I cary and break down the wall of fear and rejection I am hanging onto. It has been one crazy ride and small steps into pushing myself to be a better artist mentally.
My passion in art has always been rotating around animals, mostly large cat's. I think my passion for animals has came from my background, my childhood. My mother, who was a DNR officer for a state park in Michigan, would often bring animals home that were left at the campsite and from other people who could not take care of the animal anymore. Of course, the number's of cat's grew since we got a litter of kittens every so often. Not that I minded, I actually wanted the kittens in my room when they were born and I often carried them with me around the house. When we moved, we were able to get rid of all the cat's except two, Shiska-Bob (who was my cat) and her older sister Boots. We eventually gave Boot's away and took in someone else's cat, Tiger. Besides the cat's, we have had a total of 4 dogs: Tonka, Leroy, Gericho and Meecko. All four had passed away along with all our cat's but my love for animals have been inspired by my mom's love for animals. She merely passed it down through influence.
(Below: Me and a new lion cub, Simba, housed at Jungle Cat World in Ontario)
I had always loved tiger's, even when I felt it was over used to use decor of tiger's. I really did not know about the terrible fate the tiger holds. With my interest and passion growing for tiger's, nnow leopards and cougar's grew and before you know it, I am researching animals of all sorts. Owls have became the next love of mine along with rat's and panda's. Documentaries, The Animal Planet and the Discovery Channel have been the only TV or movie I watch (exclu
ding Naruto) because I never get enough information and with how bad my memory is, I can watch the same footage and find wit exciting and learn something new.
With friends coming into my life, I have had wonderful experience to learn and even be up close to animals. One friend of mine, Eric, gave me a wonderful opportunity to visit him in Toronto and visit the small zoo in which he volunteer's at. To say the least, I learned so much on the animals by someone who has worked and been around them, also doing research and sharing the information. I began to want to find places where I could help use my art to support these sort of places that help raise animals. I came across one sanctuary dedicated to Big Cats. Big Cat Rescue resides in Tampa, FL where they house abandoned, used, abused, and animals in
which people can not support anymore. They upload Youtube video's almost on a daily basis, sharing information to make the public aware of what they do to help conserve these animals.
I fell in love with the organization, thus my senior show idea was born.
(Below: Me and a Bobcat at Jungle Cat World in Ontario)
I wanted a show which represented me and what I love but also something I fight for. It didn't take long for me to decide what I wanted to do and why. I contacted Big Cat Rescue, asking for their permission to use testimonies from some of their big cat's to make aware that even these large cat's are abused and abandoned. It took me a while to figure out what testimonies I wanted to use, since there were over fifty to choose from (I do not know the exact number). I finally picked on four of them and incorporated them into my pieces. Before I introduced the big cat's I think it would be appropriate to share my artist's statement:
Artist's Statement:
"Control: it's something that as human's, we like to do. We try to control our future's outcome, try to control our children in the grocery store and try to control how another person behaves but there is one thing we as humans do not enjoy and that is someone controlling us. It's a vicious cycle of wanting control but not wanting to be controlled. We take this into nature, controlling the landscape and even wildlife so it's safer and more convenient for ourselves. But what if nature doesn't want to be controlled? What then? Wild and big cat's have been a target for humans to control either for profit, a goal or entertainment. When a wild cat goes out of our control, it can end disastrous and result in death either for the human and/or animal. It's doleful when an animal act's on instinct (that does not want to be controlled) is killed because of their inability to act domestically.
There are still fur farms in America where Bobcats and Lynx's are being bread and raised only to be slaughtered for their fur. Tiger's in America are in the black market where their bodies are worth more dead than alive. We get white tiger's through inbreeding and yet, not a lot of people who pay to see a white tiger know the health issues that lay underneath their fur- they just look pretty. It's the same concept we do to ourselves: we will do anything unhealthy, like starve ourselves, just to fit into a pair of jeans. Unlike humans, animals do not connect through the same senses as we do. Once we smell, touch, watch and listen to someone, it's personal and can create connect's between two people but it is not the same with animals. Even when the domesticated cat rubs it's head on a persons leg, we think it's showing affection when in reality, the cat has glads on the side of his mouth which marks and clams their territory once they rub it on someone.
I myself am still researching and pondering the fine line between control and just preserving and being educational about animal species. Being in an enclosure is not always the healthiest environment nor are they truly free but it can be through a zoo that people learn about animals and make an effort to help preserve and save the animal in the wild."
SHERE KHAN
Male Bengal/Sib
erian Tiger
DOB 12/20/94
If you saw The Tiger Next Door on Animal P
lanet, then you saw the horrid conditions at the facility owned by Dennis Hill in Flatrock, Indiana. The Ti
ger Next Door didn't air until 3/25/2010 and it was about USDA taking away
The tigers in the documentary, The Tiger Next Door, that ended up at Joe Taft's place in Indiana, named Tony and Patty where Shere Khan's parents. When I visited in 1995 he had rows upon rows of dog run styled cages, a foot or more deep in rotting feces and mud, filthy water pans, flimsy cages, some had only a rope or belt to hold a door shut, no roofs on many of the cages and then there was the barn. You didn't see much of it in the film, but it was dark, filthy and crammed as full of leopards, tigers, cougars and other exotic cats as could be fitted in tiny, barren cages. The version on Animal Planet also didn't show much of Dennis Hill's house and the obvious signs of hoarding. It was so nasty I didn't want to touch anything in the house. My skin crawled from fleas and mites. I couldn't wait to get out of the house and back to our plane, but that is when I saw Shere Khan.
Shere Khan stole our hearts when we saw him on 3/12/95. Though he was bred to be a White Tiger, he was born “the wrong color.” His birth was a result of the incessant demand for White Tigers by a public that is fascinated by oddities. Though many people believe that the White Tiger is an “endangered” species that should be bred to be saved, this is a total lie. The White Tiger results from a color mutation that happens infrequently in the wild and usually is not passed along. White animals in a forest environment would not live long due to their inability to hide and sneak up on prey. When you hear the phrase “survival of the fittest,” remember that nature does not allow the genetically mutated White Tiger to survive in the wild nor should we in captivity.
Shere Khan did not have much of a chance for survival from the start. Dennis Hill had pre-sold him as a white cub, but the purchaser kept putting off his delivery date. He finally cancelled the sale when Shere Khan was already four months old. The breeders were left with a quickly growing cub on their hands and no other facilities for him other than a small carrier. He was up to his belly in feces and decaying food in a pet taxi that seemed to just bust at the seams with tiger fur. He never got the vitamins and exercise he needed as a growing cub, so his back legs were badly underdeveloped. He was very sick for a long time and suffered major problems from calcium deficiency. X-rays showed that his baby canine teeth were rotting in their sockets from his malnourishment and they had to be excised because they had rotted through his face. His bones were mere paper shells and one wrong jump could easily break a leg. We supplemented him three times a day with calcium to encourage healthy bones and teeth.
CATERA
Male Bobcat
DOB 7/24/97
His parents, Shiloh and Indian Summer had been a bonded pair for seven years before coming to live on Easy Street. They had never reproduced, so we left them together and of course a littler of three resulted in just a few short months. The mother, on the third day, began killing the kittens and by the time the Founder could get to her, two were dead and she was biting the last one on the chest and abdomen. She snatched the bleeding kitten away from her and took it to medicate and bottle raise. It wasn't long before the she discovered why the mother had brutally attacked her offspring. Catera (named for theCaddy that zigs) was obviously brain damaged and from the condition of all three kittens, it was apparent that they had not been nursing although the dam had stayed with them faithfully. It took hours to feed Catera and every time, it was as if it was the first time for him. It took him a year to get on to solid foods and again, every meal was like the first he ever had. If his surrogate mother walks out of the room and walks back in ten minutes later, he has forgotten who she was and only through the vocalizations they have shared over and over and over does he again recognize her. Every day is new and exciting to Catera and he is quite possibly the happiest cat living on Easy Street.
Catera runs incessantly in circles and attacks everyone he can't remember, which is everyone he knows. Catera has shown much improvement over the years and is doing very well with his operant conditioning sessions. He has learned 3 behaviors in only a few months.Catera has his own Cat-a-tat that provides plenty of running room. Most of our bobcats were rescued from fur farms where they were being raised to slaughter for their fur. Some were being sold at auction where taxidermists would buy them and club them to death in the parking lot, but a few were born here in the early days when we were ignorant of the truth and were being told by the breeders and dealers that these cats should be bred for "conservation." Once we learned that there are NO captive breeding programs that actually contribute to conservation in the wild we began neutering and spaying our cats in the mid 1990's. Knowing what we do about the intelligence and magnificence of these creatures we do not believe that exotic cats should be bred for lives in cages.
Natasha
Female Siberian Lynx
DOB: unknown
Natasha (on left) was rescued, along with 27 other cats, from a fur farm. She cost more than any of the other cats because she is exquisitely beautiful. She has survived poisoning and a very scary seizure in 1996. She was diagnosed with heart worms in 1997 and recovered very slowly. We had never seen heartworms in the exotic cats, and as a result of her infestation have made it a policy to treat all of Big Cat Rescue’s animals with Ivermectin, which is a de-wormer, as a preventative. Natasha shares a Cat-a-tat with Willow, they love each others company and are two of the very first cats seen on our guided tours. One of Natasha’s favorite things to do is chew. She, like most Siberian lynx, have a love for chewing. She will chew just about anything, sticks, pine cones, cardboard tubes, but her favorite of all are pineapple tops. She does not eat these things, but rather tears off tiny pieces of them with her front teeth and then spits it out. She will continue with this until there is nothing left of whatever item fell victim to her chewing. Natasha is lovable and fun-loving and considers no one a stranger.
DESIREE
Female Serval
DOB unknown
Arrived at Big Cat Rescue 10/11/2009
Serval Rescue! An African Serval was limping along in the Arizona desert until she collapsed alongside a road. She had almost completely given up the will to live. She was probably a pet or perhaps used in the hybrid breeding schemethat has become all the rage where Servals are bred to domestic house cats to produce Savannah Cat hybrids. The domestic cats are often killed in the process. The kittens sell for thousands of dollars, but when they mature they typically spray and bite and make awful pets. The hybrids are usually discarded by the time they are two or three years old.
This Serval was obviously abandoned and was placed by authorities at the Tucson Wildlife Center, a non-profit sanctuary dedicated to native wildlife. Lisa Bates-Lininger the founding president of the Tucson Wildlife Center said, "She was dehydrated and tired and just ready to give up. She may have died last night, but luckily we got her in. We got her emergency treatment, fluids for shock, and she's also missing a rear leg."
Despite 18 media posts including TV news in Tucson and a post on Craig's list looking for the owner no one admits to having abandoned this Serval to die in the desert. Thanks to some very generous supporters the serval was flown to her new permanent home at Big Cat Rescue where she is recovering well. Servals can live into their late teens and proper care is thousands of dollars each year. Her new 1,200 square foot Cat-a-tat had to be specially modified to accommodate her three legged hopping. It seems that she only recently lost her leg as she has a very difficult time keeping her balance. We are writing vets in the Tucson area to find out if any of them know what tragedy caused her to lose a limb and to see if there is any way to prosecute those who exposed her to such danger.
