Tamiyoi making the big call

In the form of a monumental sculpture, Gillie and Marc have brought the lives of elephants to the forefront of peoples minds at Marble Arch in London. The biggest elephant sculpture in the world, ‘The Orphans’ comments on the thousands of calves which are orphaned every day because of the selfish actions of humans. In the sculpture, 20 orphaned elephant calves are running towards a mother, representing the mother that all the babies have lost.

To coincide with the public sculpture, the artists have transformed each of the 20 baby elephants into a beautiful print. The prints will be exhibited to give the public another look at the beautiful elephant calves, to help them to fall in love with them, and to remind them of what could be lost if we don’t work together to save them. This exhibition along with the sculpture will be the most important exhibition for elephant conservation in the world.

The individual calves are named and based off a real orphaned elephant from the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, an elephant orphanage in Kenya, which Gillie and Marc visited on a trip in 2018. The artists wanted to show the real stories and personalities of the lives left behind and to inspire the desire to do more. Therefore, each of the real calves in Kenya is available for the public to adopt. By going to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust website, the public can play an active role in the daily care and overall survival of the calf.