BBC Dynasties, Chimpanzee Politics

The first episode of David Attenborough’s newest series, Dynasties, aired this past Sunday. It followed the fortunes of David, the aging alpha of a Senegal chimpanzee troop. The life of an alpha is not easy; David must constantly fend off challenges from other males that covet his position and the benefits that go along with it (i.e. preferential mating with females in estrus). Clashes for the leadership position are often violent and can have fatal consequences.

The episode condensed two years of footage into one hour. Doubtless there was a lot that was omitted in favour of telling a compelling story, but David’s intelligence and resilience shine through. As an aging leader, David strategically hid his weaknesses and formed alliances with older non-threatening males.

In contrast to this strategizing, David’s younger would-be usurpers were more overtly physical in their quest to become alpha. One young male, Jumkin, was shown bullying an elderly female. Another young male, Luthor, spent weeks violently throwing rocks during David’s absence (the BBC filming crew feared for their safety during these intimidating displays).

Ultimately, David recovered the leadership position, giving viewers a seemingly happy ending. However, since the conclusion of filming, BBC reports that David was killed by a coalition led by Jumkin and Luthor, and Jumkin has now become the alpha of the troop. Dr. Jill Pruetz, the anthropologist that studies the troop, reports that David was quite aggressive, and this is why he was able to defend his position for so long. Perhaps this is also why he met a violent end, since other males that survive to old age do so by relinquishing power and submitting when they are past their prime.

At any rate, I think the instructive part of the episode was David’s apparent skill at fostering alliances with the older males. Under Jumkin’s rule, the chimpanzee troop has been less stable and cohesive; the group doesn’t pay him the same level of respect as they did to David. It would seem that effective leadership demands more than being the biggest and loudest bully.

Frans De Waal has studied and written extensively about chimpanzee politics and many of his findings are instructive and applicable to human situations. In the following TedTalk on alphas, he notes that effective chimpanzee leaders must project strength, but they also have the ability to foster troop unity, play peacemaker, and they frequently stand up for the weak and the vulnerable, displaying high levels of empathy. Perhaps some of our leaders could learn a thing or two from these chimpanzees.

The B Word... Business

The past month has been busy, although I haven’t been painting as much as I’d like. Instead, I’ve been learning more about the business side of art, which I’ve largely ignored up until now.

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been learning how to photograph and make reproductions of my work. I’ll be making prints available for sale soon. Thankfully I didn’t have to figure this out on my own. Tim Packer has put out a helpful YouTube video on the topic.

I’ve enrolled in a TSA class called Professional Studio, and I attended my first class last week. Maria-Saroja Ponnambalam is the instructor and she’s really enthusiastic and supportive! My classmates are a diverse and talented group and I’m hopeful that we’ll learn a lot from each other. The class delves into many of the practical aspects of being an artist (e.g. approaching galleries, how to network and market yourself, how to join the artistic community through collectives, how to make funding proposals, etc). I’m really looking forward to learning more in the weeks to come.

Another first: I submitted my paintings for jurying a couple of weeks ago, and I had my first art show this past weekend. The eve of the show was somewhat hair raising because I had a health incident at the same time. Fortunately, MacKenzie was there to nurse me and hang my paintings for the show (I couldn’t ask for a more supportive partner)!

As for the show itself, it was exciting to put my work up for public viewing and sale at long last. As it turns out, the Three Wise Tamarins sold and they’ve found a new home! I didn’t expect to sell anything this weekend, but when I showed up on Sunday night and saw the tamarins gone from their spot on the wall, I felt a mixture of feelings: mainly happiness that they’ve gone out into the world and that they’re providing someone with enjoyment, but also a hint of sadness that I wouldn’t see them again. I guess this is the cycle that every artist hopes to go through!

In a week-and-a-half, I’ll be entering my second show with the Don Valley Art Club at Todmorden Mills which runs from Nov 14-25. Come check it out if you can. After that show wraps up, I’ll be done with the current zoo series of paintings (I currently have the 10th and final painting on my easel which just needs a few finishing touches).

Heading into 2019, I’ll be looking to start a new series that will incorporate some different ideas and techniques (it will still be animal-based). I’m looking forward to exploring and sharing this new direction in the months to come.

Arachnophilia

Yesterday as I was entering the house, I saw a decent sized jumping spider (the largest I’ve seen yet) peeking out from behind our mailbox. Because of its size, I thought it might be a female (about 1.5 cm long). I called Mack to come over and look at it, but it became shy at all of the attention and retreated behind the mailbox, so we left it alone. I went outside a bit later to see if it was still there, but it was nowhere to be found. Shortly afterwards, Mack found it crawling around in our front foyer, so apparently it had snuck in or followed me into the house.

I first learned about jumping spiders when I began looking into macro photography. Jumping spiders have appealing proportions (chunky body parts, large eyes, furry). They hunt by stalking their prey instead of ensnaring their victims in a web. Depending on the prey, they will use different hunting strategies and they are considered unusually intelligent (a study from 2016 demonstrated that they formulate plans). Recently, some researchers trained a jumping spider named Kim to jump on cue to study its jumping capabilities.

This morning I googled jumping spiders to try and identify the guest in our house. Based on coloration and markings, it may be a male bold jumping spider. One fact that I learned about jumping spiders is that males (who are smaller) will employ a mating dance to signal to a female that they are not prey. These displays can be quite elaborate and mesmerizing. If you’re afraid of spiders, check out the following video. These little critters just might charm you.

Small Cruelties

Yesterday I went to the Toronto Zoo to see their six week old pygmy hippo calf. I spent three hours observing her and her mother in their pool, hoping to capture a good moment on camera. Like most babies, she spent a lot of the time napping. I also noticed that she had a couple of favourite spots; one on the edge of the ramp leading up to land, and the other beside a pillar under the pedestrian walkway. Whenever she would nap beside the pillar, I noticed after a few minutes that Kindia would grunt at her, beckoning her to return to the edge of the ramp. A highlight of the day was seeing the calf nurse from Kindia underwater. It was heartwarming to see their bond.

While I was watching the hippos, I also had the chance to see people’s responses to them. Almost unanimously, people cooed when they saw the baby, and most spent a few minutes observing her and taking snapshots before moving on. There was one notable exception: a group of teen boys. As Kindia and her calf swam under the bridge, the boys leaned over the railing and one of them spit. Appalled, all I could think to say was , “Don’t spit. Don’t spit!” He mumbled an apology. In hindsight, this could have been a teachable moment, but I seldom deal with kids and I’m not all that great off-the-cuff.

At any rate, I think this small incident is a double tragedy. A boy sees a critically endangered pygmy hippo and her daughter (less than 3000 left in the wild) and he spits on them rather than being amazed or feeling empathy. It’s tempting to view this as a sign of the times, but then I remembered a friend from university who witnessed a nearly identical incident when he visited the pygmy hippo 20 years ago (he yelled at the boy and told him that his saliva was filled with bacteria and potential disease vectors that could make the pygmy hippo sick). I’m also reminded of a scene from Dumbo, where the teen boys cruelly bully Dumbo for his large ears. It seems that for some (many?), empathy for animals doesn’t come naturally; it must be fostered and taught.

Today I returned to the zoo to photograph the pygmy hippos again. As I was leaving the zoo, I passed by the Sumatran Tiger enclosure and I saw a large family standing by the railing looking at the tiger below them. The father picked up something from the ground and threw it at the tiger. I yelled at him, “Hey! Don’t throw stuff at the tiger!” The family all turned to look at me. “Okay,” was his mumbled response. Perhaps I need to prepare a speech for incidents like these.

Anthropocene at the AGO

Yesterday we saw the Anthropocene exhibit at the AGO which showcased Edward Burtynsky’s photos and videos from Jennifer Baichwal and Nicholas de Pencier. It was eye opening and disturbing to see the radically altered landscapes wrought by human activity. Some of the subjects included mining, deforestation, landfills, urban development, coral bleaching, and reshaping of coastal outlines. The exhibit also included AR installations of the last Northern White Rhino Male (who passed away this year) and the largest collection of confiscated elephant ivory tusks.

At the exhibit, Mack and I felt the curious tension of appreciating the beauty of Burtynsky’s images while feeling troubled by the destruction they represented. Part of this was down to Burtynsky’s eye for composition, but I’m also reminded of something a former art teacher told me: there are no straight lines in nature. In the human mind there exists a desire for simplicity, rhythm and order, and in many of the manufactured landscapes there were clear demarcations and geometric order.

In a way, I see Burtynsky’s work as a modern counterpart to JMW Turner’s paintings of Industrial Age England. Turner was unabashed in his celebration of progress. Burtynsky’s photographs are more ambiguous and they reveal the dark side of capitalism and progress.

Asian Elephant Safari

For our birthdays, Mack and I visited African Lion Safari last week. As a precaution, I removed the car’s windshield wipers before we entered the reserve, but the baboons were well-behaved (to my secret disappointment). We saw the eponymous lions in the reserve; one lioness walked beside our car as she crossed the road.

As it turns out, the Asian Elephants were the highlight of our day. We saw them take a group swim in a small lake. As part of their enrichment, the keepers used a slingshot to fling apples into the middle of the lake which the elephants pursued with some gusto.

We learned more about elephants during a keeper talk inside the park. Towards the end of the talk, one of the keepers handed Jenny the elephant a paintbrush and she made some colourful abstract marks on a T-shirt which was offered up for sale to help fund conservation efforts. This brought to mind a video I had seen of an Asian Elephant in Thailand that had learned to paint a stylized elephant by rote. Does Suda regard her marks as representing an elephant? There are other examples of animals making paintings, but to my knowledge this is the only example of an animal making a representational painting.

The earliest human cave paintings are of hand stencils and geometric marks. It’s impossible to know the precise meaning and significance of these paintings, but it seems that mark making, as a kind of “I was here”, is a primary impulse. To me, intentionality is what makes these marks art, whereas fossilized footprints are not. As far as animal-made art goes, there is some debate about the intention of their animal creators. If you’re interested in reading more about animal-made art, check out the following essay: Can Animals Make Art?

About Three Wise Tamarins

Golden Lion Tamarins (GLTs) are a perennial favourite at the Toronto Zoo. With their golden fur, their inquisitive expressions, and their frenetic squirrel-like energy,  they have an irresistible visual appeal. In terms of behaviour, their ample mutual grooming sessions evoke the sense of an idyllic, close knit family group. 

GLTs are native to the coastal rainforests of Brazil. In the 1970's, logging and clearing destroyed the majority of their habitat and brought them to the brink of extinction. To combat their decline, zoos around the world were enlisted to help through a captive breeding program. Thanks to their efforts and the establishment of biological reserves in Brazil, captive bred GLTs have been reintroduced back into the wild and their conservation status has been upgraded from critically endangered to endangered. Habitat fragmentation continues to be a threat to their existence and much work remains to be done, but this conservation success story offers some hope. 

Check out this Smithsonian video to gain an appreciation for the charm and the remarkable adaptations of the GLT. 

About Little Head Rest

Today there are 5 surviving rhino species: Indian, Black, White, Sumatran and Javan. In March 2018, the last Northern White Rhino male passed away, leaving two females as the sole surviving members of the Northern subspecies of the White Rhino. The Southern White Rhino is currently near threatened, the Indian Rhino is vulnerable, and the other rhino species are critically endangered. The biggest threats to the continued survival of rhinos are habitat loss and poaching. Rhino horns, which are comprised of keratin (the same material in our fingernails and hair), fetch thousands of dollars on the black market (in 2012, rhino horns were worth $65K per kg - more than gold or cocaine). Although keratin has no medicinal value, rhino horns are used in Chinese Traditional Medicine, and in Vietnam they are erroneously thought to be a cure for cancer. 

The subjects of Little Head Rest are Ashakiran and her son Kiran, who was born in the Toronto Zoo in early 2018. Watching them, I saw Kiran run in circles around his mom. During quieter moments, they would nuzzle and lie down together. There is something poignant about the combination of strength, tenderness and vulnerability of these creatures.  

Throughout history, rhinos have inspired and amazed people. Some speculate that verbal accounts of the Indian Rhino inspired the unicorn myth. Even today, there is much that we don't know. Recently shot footage reveals that the White Rhino has rich social interactions when nighttime descends:  

Underpainting of Silver Leaf Langurs

Here is the underpainting of my latest work. 

I saw this mother and child at the Columbus Zoo. They're native to Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo. Silver Leaf Langurs are born bright orange and they turn silvery black as they mature. All the females in the troop share parenting responsibilities (this is known as alloparenting). However, this female seemed quite protective; while the baby was sleeping, she shielded it from another inquisitive adult female. Or maybe she didn't want the baby to wake up, because once nap time was over it clambered all over her like she was a jungle gym.

Howdy!

Thanks for stopping by!

I'll be using this blog to share photos of my works in progress, as well as musings about art and animals in the weeks and months to come. My goal is to produce 15 pieces for a show some time in 2019. 

If you have instagram, you can also follow me @georgeleeart. 

Cheers