The War Against Nature is Over - Five Photos

Chiba - Japan - March 13 - 2011 

It was the morning after the big one; before any of us really knew how much danger we were in from Tepco, their lies and their radiation.(Ed. One hundred kilometers or so to the north the roof of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant had just blown off ). 

I thought there couldn't be a more apt time to photograph Toothfish's "The War on Nature is Over" poster than right then! I jumped in the car with the kids and we drove around surveying the damage. I took some shots with the poster in the most obvious context of quake damage(see photo above) but decided that a less cliched approach would work better. That's why I settled on my final choice of the concrete wall of a Tone River spill over. Not only does it give no indication of the disaster that had just taken place, but it hardly even gives any hint as to where it was taken. Without the caption of Japan and the date, one would barely have any visual clue to indicate the location of the shot  and something about the stoic minimalism appealed to me at the time. 

Photo and text by Riki Agnew Te Paa

                                                                                                                                           'Lovely Lady  Ironing Poster' - New Delhi - India - March 2011

 In India most people send their clothes out to be ironed by the local "dhobi walla". In most cases this is a man  but when we moved into our house in Delhi we noticed a women who was working as a dhobi walla and we decided to send our clothes to her. She was a lovely lady and always had a smile on her face. It made you happy to just say "Hi" to her.

I'm not 100% sure what the poster means but I like it.

Photo and text by Tom Sampson

'Statue of Liberty Lady' - New York - March 2012

I was in New York City postering Manhattan for a couple of gigs when I noticed that the Statue of Liberty had left her pedestal on Ellis Island and strolled into town. She had kindly decided to help out an insurance company by standing on a corner handing out fliers to passers-by in the hope of generating some business for the insurers and some cover for the residents. She must have known that Nature had it in for New York that year (Ed. Hurricane Sandy arrived in October) but she obligingly agreed to assist Toothfish. She wanted the unnatural war to be OVER!

Photo and text by Sheridan Orr

'Underwater Street Art' - Roatan - Honduras - November 2012

After seeing the Sheep sticker on my water bottle, photographer Mark Dudzinski who was close to completing his PADI Dive Master Internship with West End Divers pointed to it and asked what it was all about.  I told him that a friend of mine is a street artist whose posters have gone worldwide to send a social message. I also suggested he might like to help me take a shot of it on the reef. "For Sure",  he replied.  "How about we take a spear and place it strategically so it looks like your animal spearing has backfired?"

With that idea we were both inspired and went on a mission to get the shot.   It was taken at a dive site called Bikini Bottom at about a depth of six metres.

The posters main meaning for me is that there is a change of consciousness happening in the world.  The time of greed and waste as well as a lack of compassion for the creatures that share this world with us is coming to an end.  A new level of awareness is about to begin.

Photo and Text by Bridgette Gower

'The World's Most Southern Piece of Street- Art' - Antarctica - November 2012

When I was asked if I could take some of Toothfish's posters to Antarctica I thought it sounded like a great idea - street art in a very un-streetish place! I was heading down to begin work on my PhD looking at  how the ice sheets might react to current climate change. Taking pictures was a bit of a challenge however, we had strong winds for a lot of our time in the field, not ideal for holding up a poster. Luckily we had a few calmer days before we went home and I could stick the poster to a colour coordinated tent. As I grappled with with the breeze and the cold, it occurred to me that the war against nature was most certainly not over in Antarctica. In fact, Antarctica constantly beat us, preventing us from getting out and doing work by flinging snow in our faces. Being in a place like that certainly brings home the power of the natural world, and makes you stand back and admire it with awe.The photo was taken at a temporary camp between Mount Discovery and Minna Bluff on the Ross ice Shelf.

Photo and text by Bella Duncan