Biodiversity, illustrated in a truly creative way
The winning entries of the international art competition "Wild Postcard Project" have been chosen.
More than 800 works of art by children and young people between the ages of five and 18 were created as part of the "Wild Postcard Project" competition. They show the diversity of living organisms such as plants, fungi, insects and mammals from all habitats in Germany. "The competition team would like to thank all of the young artists who have shown so much love and care in illustrating snapshots of Germany's biological diversity in the most creative and imaginative works ever submitted to this competition," emphasizes Dr. Angela Stevenson, one of the initiators of the project. "We were particularly pleased with the many wonderful group works, where up to 28 children worked together on a single piece of art."
Seven jurors took on the challenging task this year of selecting the 15 best from the multitude of submitted artworks based on artistic and scientific criteria. Four of them came from GEOMAR: Jamie Parker, Kwi Han, Nico Smith Sanchez and Nora Grossschmidt. "A big thank you also goes to GEOMAR, which provided additional funding to make the competition possible in Germany" said Dr. Angela Stevenson.
All winning entries are featured in an online gallery on the Wild Postcard Project website.
About the Wild Postcard Project
The Wild Postcard Project is an initiative founded in 2016 by Dr. Eileen Diskin (University College Dublin Innovation Academy) and Dr. Angela Stevenson (GEOMAR). Both are scientists and graduated from the School of Natural Sciences at Trinity College Dublin. In addition to their research, they wanted to live out their creative side - and raise public awareness of biodiversity - so they sat down in a pub one evening to brainstorm for ideas. Out came the Wild Postcard Project initiative, which started in Ireland.
The postcard's nature subject aims to showcase local biodiversity to the world. For example, although Ireland is small, it is home to an enormous diversity of organisms and ecosystems, including majestic golden eagles and ancient oak forests.
"Through the Wild Postcard Project, we hope to share this diversity of nature with people around the world. Knowing that the most successful approaches to protecting plants and animals around the world often originate and are sustained at the grassroots level of society, we hope to inspire people to engage with their own local biodiversity," organizers said.
