'Green Lung Totem'

INSPIRATION
This piece represents the essential role plants play in the natural balance of the world. Symbolising a precious resource essential to all life on earth and which is also vital for humanity.
I thought about the contribution plants make to the oxygen levels, hence the lungs, and worked on the idea of trees being the lungs of the world. So I used green coloured materials, sourced from car boot sales and household rubbish, to represent the leaves of plants. Emerging from the lungs are green-covered wires from fake flower stems, which represents the carbon dioxide in and oxygen being breathed out into the air.
But man has taken for granted the natural balance of the world, by the exploitation of plants. And in our greed man sometimes ignores the lessons learned by past generations and does not consider the consequences for the future. E.g. deforestation, pollution.
I used the totem because it is a well known symbol, made by Indigenous Cultures who know how to live in harmony and balance with their ancestral lands, animals, plants we must relearn from them a better way NOW.