Work from nine artists and illustrators from around the world accompany the themes of the White Paper and Compendium, helping bring to life the opportunities, challenges, pain and beauty of Environmental Peacebuilding. The artists come from Afghanistan, the USA, Rwanda | Uganda, the UK, Japan, Hawai’i, Morocco and Ireland.
Shamsia Hassani
Shamsia Hassani, born in 1988 to Afghan parents in Tehran, Iran, is a Master of Visual Arts from Kabul University of Afghanistan. As an artist, Shamsia has exhibited her works and created murals in more than 15 countries (3 continents, Asia, Europe and North America) around the world.
Rosanna Morris
Rosanna Morris is a printmaker and illustrator from the UK who has long been interested in sustainability, food sovereignty and growing food. Many of her prints explore themes of agriculture, horticulture and the natural world, and she believes in the power of print as a means of communication and collaboration.
Shar Tuiasoa
Shar Tuiasoa is a Pasifika illustrator from the island of O'ahu, Hawai'i, where she was born and raised. After earning her BFA in illustration from California, she headed home to spend her time in the ocean, enjoying the vibrant culture of her home, and imagining and creating for her illustration business, Punky Aloha Studio.
Sonya Montenegro
Sisters Sonya (on the right) and Nina Montenegro are illustrators, printmakers, menders, quilters, and gardeners. In 2013 they founded The Far Woods, a creative collaboration making artwork that seeks to contribute to a culture shift in which there is a land ethic, reverence for nature, rejection of the dominant throw-away mentality, and direct connection to where our food and the things we use come from.
Samuel Kambari
Samuel Kambari is an artist from Rwanda whose work tells stories of African culture, beauty, and togetherness. He is chief executive at Inshuti Art Gallery, Kigali, and is known for his colours and textures that show striking, semi-figurative depictions of female empowerment and gender equality concepts.
Ed Oner
Mohamed Touirs, under the artist name Ed Oner, is the current revelation of Moroccan street art. Between exhibitions and urban murals, he has forged his reputation nationally and internationally, and continues to follow his creative path both digitally and on the walls and streets of Morocco.
Lynn Finnegan
Lynn Finnegan is an illustrator and art director from Ireland whose work explores and celebrates the living planet, focusing on issues of ecology, non-violence and sustainability. She seeks to tell empowering, solutions-based stories that provide a glimpse into the joys and beauty of the global movement of people quietly working towards a peaceful, living planet.
Victoria Nakada
Victoria Nakada is an artist from Japan now residing in Hawaii, who is often inspired by nature and science. She is most known for her houses on stilts and characters called ‘Moonies’, which she uses to share the sense of home through her artwork.
Nina Montenegro
Sisters Sonya and Nina (on the left) Montenegro are illustrators, printmakers, menders, quilters, and gardeners. In 2013 they founded The Far Woods, a creative collaboration making artwork that seeks to contribute to a culture shift in which there is a land ethic, reverence for nature, rejection of the dominant throw-away mentality, and direct connection to where our food and the things we use come from.
A poem by Becca Farnum
Some days I look around and see a planet in pieces
Other days, I look around and know nature is where peace is
We’ve created a world at war
Dragging Nature into our quest for more
Using scarce resources
As an excuse for armed forces
When all around us
The Earth models coexistence
Ecosystems are an insistence
Of our interdependent need
Biodiversity speaks in resistance
To othering and greed
We use art to teach
Because we know art can reach
Parts of us we often silence
Art can help us end this violence
Because art is all about picking up the pieces
And showcasing, amidst brokenness, where peace is
by Shamsia Hassani (Afghanistan)
by Rosanna Morris (UK)
by Shar Tuiasoa (Hawai’i, USA)
by Sonya Montenegro (USA)
by Samuel Kambari (Rwanda | Uganda)
by Ed Oner (Morocco)
by Lynn Finnegan (Ireland)
by Victoria Nakada (Japan | USA)
by Nina Montenegro (USA)