Spotlight
Climate change – How children see the global challenge
| Flood: Again and again the people in Bangladesh have to rescue their possessions from the surging waters. The painting by 12-year-old Zayaan Masood (yellow T-shirt) reflects this sad reality. The photo was taken in the flood plain of a tributary of the Ganges. |
Last year the 12-year-old entered his painting in the international painting competition held regularly by Bayer and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP): the external link: 16th “International Children’s Painting Competition on the Environment". Zayaan Masood is one of the winners.
A short time later the boy experienced a flood first hand. He sits on a teetering raft while beside him people hold up the enlargement of his prize-winning picture. Behind him is a village half-submerged in water. It is as if his drawing has come to life.
Photographer Peter Ginter visited some of the young artists in their home countries to take portraits of them together with their paintings. He traveled with Zayaan to the village of Sherasgunge, about two hours by car from the capital, Dhaka, where he was able to capture the scene in Zayaan’s painting with his camera. Ginter wants to use his photographs to show that the children’s paintings are not simply products of their imaginations, but rather frighteningly close to reality.
A total of 13,450 paintings from 104 countries were entered in the 2007 children’s painting competition. The 2008 competition has even achieved a record level of 15,400 entries. The painting competition is one of the central projects of the successful partnership between Bayer and unep, and has since become a World Environment Day fixture. The motto for the 2008 competition is “Climate change: actions we can take now to reduce our negative impact.”
You can read more about climate change here. More information on the children’s painting competition and accompanying photos can be found external link: here.