Burning of the Amazon Forest – Art for Planet Earth touring exhibitions 2024/5

Who is burning down the Amazon rainforest? The story in this painting is just one of the ways humanity is destroying the planet: the torching of a rich and complex ecosystem. On one side there’s an evil looking bloke who’s the culprit, representing the money and profit to be gained by this devastation. A box of matches, a flaming stick, burn it down, hey ho, who cares?

On the left is what’s lost in this mass of smoke and flame: an indigenous man looking at the loss of his home and community, the plants and the animals who rely on the forest. The men in the middle make sure the fires keep going so they can start ploughing. Whose fault is it? All of us. Humanity is at war with Nature.

The burning of the Amazon forest since 1960 has destroyed an area the size of France for cattle ranching and monocultures such as soybean, palm oil and eucalyptus trees. Two billion trees have been felled since 1988. By 2030 livestock farming, logging expansion, illegal mining, water contamination, fire and drought could destroy or severely damage 55% of the rainforest. Scientists warn the Amazon rainforest is close to a tipping point after which it will not be able to recover and degrade into a dry savannah. The tipping point is 20%-25% of deforestation, and 17% has already been reached. With increased fires the forest will turn into a CO2 foe instead of friend.

The good news is that Brazil’s President Lula da Silva was voted in at the end of 2022 with an election manifesto of zero illegal deforestation by 2030, laws against poverty, drug gangs, illegal mining, promoting sustainable development, and protecting the rights of indigenous people. Logging has dropped by 39%. But there’s a long way to go.

Nature’s DNA needs protecting. It will take perseverance, political pressure and will, money and individual activism to tackle the crisis in the Amazon forest. We need to value the forest before paradise is lost.