Summary
16 November 2009
The stumps of ten rainforest trees have been placed around London's Trafalgar Square to highlight the issue of deforestation. Ghost Forest, by artist Angela Palmer, will remain in the square until Friday.
Reporter:
David Sillito
Naturally fallen trees in a forest in Ghana
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The ten stumps arrived overnight, having been shipped by the artist, Angela Palmer, from a sustainable forestry in Ghana. Most had fallen naturally, and the original trees would have been as tall as Nelson's column.
But now the stumps are laid out across the square as an artwork, albeit one with a purpose to show people what exactly has been lost through deforestation and also to celebrate the work in Ghana to promote responsible logging.
This though is only a temporary exhibition. The trees have to make another journey after this, to Copenhagen and the forthcoming UN climate change conference.
David Sillito, 大象传媒 News, London
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Vocabulary
- stumps
here, a stump means the roots and the base of the trunk of a fallen tree
- a sustainable forestry
forestland that has been planted for commercial purposes and is carefully managed so it can continue to grow for a long period of time
- laid out across the square
put in a particular order, as instructed by the artist, in different parts of the square
- an artwork
something beautiful and/or thought-provoking that has been created by human effort rather than by nature; sometimes a work of art is created to serve a particular purpose or to promote a particular cause, e.g. here, to attract people's attention to the threat of deforestation (see below)
- albeit
even though, although
- deforestation
causing a lot of damage to forests by cutting down a lot of trees in large areas
- to promote responsible logging
to encourage people to cut down trees responsibly, i.e. causing forests as little harm as possible
- temporary
not permanent, existing for a limited period of time
