Latest news with #NilgiriBiosphere
Daily Mail
06-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Year-long great elephant migration ends in Beverly Hills as beasts shock by strolling past Rodeo Drive
It was a most peculiar sight to behold in ritzy Beverly Hills - a herd of 100 elephants marching past Rodeo Drive. At a quick glance you would be forgiven for thinking that the trunked beasts emerging from the dark were the real deal however they are purely very life-like sculptures and part of the Great Elephant Migration project. The herd of beasts have been on quite the journey after they started in Newport, Rhode Island, on July 4 last year and traveled 5,000 miles across the country taking in places from New York City to Miami Beach, the Vegas Strip and Houston. 'They have crossed oceans, highways, beaches and endless plains. Walked clifftops & cobblestones through sand and snow. Made millions of friends and spoken for all animals great and small,' the Great Elephant Migration wrote on its official Instagram. 'Their migration speaks for the millions of wild animals navigating plantations, highways, and urban spaces around the world through their story from India where they live alongside their creators, @therealeleco, who live alongside their real-life counterparts and know them as extended family.' The elephants are made out of West Indian Lantana, an invasive weed that pushes elephants out of their natural habitats in the country. The artwork was created by 200 indigenous artists in the Bettakurumba, Paniya, Kattunayakan and Soliga communities of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve. The art exhibition is a global fundraising project that also aims to raise awareness about the beasts. The Great Elephant Migration website explained: 'In the last 30 years the population of India has doubled to 1.4 billion. 'Remarkably, the population of elephants, rhinos, lions and tigers has also doubled over this period. 'They coexist in extraordinary ways, tolerating each other and constantly negotiating space. 'India's elephants are flagships for coexistence with 80 percent of their range outside of Protected Areas. 'In Gudalur, in the Nilgiri Hills, 150 elephants share space with a quarter of a million people. 'Humans and elephants share the same land, food and water, but still find ways to live alongside each other relatively peacefully. 'A range of beliefs and practices emphasize respect and reverence for nature. India's ancient cultures go hand in hand with a range of modern technologies, from smart fences to AI based monitoring systems. 'Their remarkable relationship with wildlife is ultimately down to a collective empathy for other living beings at a national scale. The elephant sculptures are available to purchase for between $8,000 and $22,000. The website stated that money raised through The Great Elephant Migration will be directed to projects that protect biodiversity and enable people and wildlife to share space. Beverly Hills Mayor Sharona Nazarian welcomed the sculptures this week and said: 'The Great Elephant Migration is more than an art installation. 'It's a powerful sign of unity... and a reminder of our joint responsibility to protect our planet and wildlife.' Spanning four blocks along Santa Monica Boulevard from Rodeo Drive to Rexford Drive, the sculptures will remain on display until August 1.
Vogue
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Vogue
Blanketed in Meaning: The Great Elephant Migration Reaches a Ceremonial Finale in Beverly Hills
On Friday evening, in the heart of Beverly Hills, a convoy of brightly decorated trucks—festooned in traditional Indian lorry art—pulled into the Eva and Marc Stern Arrival Court at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. Inside them: 100 life-sized elephant sculptures, made not of stone or bronze but of a humble invasive plant. This was the final stop of The Great Elephant Migration—a 5,000-mile public art journey that has moved through cities, tribal lands, and national parks across the United States—and the elephants arrived swathed in something new: more than 70 bespoke blankets, created by designers and Indigenous communities around the world in a ceremonial offering called 'Wrapped in History.' Photo: Victor Arriola/ Photo: Victor Arriola/ The sculptures themselves are the work of the Real Elephant Collective, a sustainable, community-owned enterprise of 200 Indigenous artisans from India's Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve. Using Lantana camara—an aggressive weed that chokes native forests—the artisans spent years handcrafting each elephant based on a real-life counterpart. Bulls, cows, calves, and tuskers were shaped with anatomical precision, their forms bent and woven from dried reeds in a process as environmentally conscious as it was emotionally resonant. The stop in Los Angeles marked the first time the Real Elephant Collective had joined the US tour in person—representing a powerful reunion between creator and creation. Ruth Ganesh, Kristin Davis Photo: Victor Arriola/ Photo: Victor Arriola/ Since debuting during the pandemic in London's Hyde Park, the herd has trotted through Newport, Manhattan, Miami Beach, Jackson Hole, and more. But Los Angeles was something different: a ceremonial close, a new artistic layer, and a powerful gesture of reverence. 'Blankets are wrapped around members of the community as a sign of respect,' said Ruth Ganesh, the UK-born conservationist and co-creator of the project. 'This echoes traditions across many Indigenous cultures, where blankets symbolize protection, honor, and belonging. In the context of the Migration, each draped elephant becomes a living monument—wrapped in collective memory and care.' Photo: Victor Arriola/ Photo: Victor Arriola/ The idea for the blanketing was born last fall, during an All Night Smoke hosted by the Blackfeet Nation, where Ganesh saw elders and guests alike arrive wrapped in traditional blankets. What followed was a new curatorial initiative led by Indian designer Vikram Goyal, who invited collaborators from the worlds of fashion, Indigenous craft, and textile heritage to create ceremonial pieces—each infused with ancestral motifs and messages of coexistence. Kristin Davis Photo: Victor Arriola/ Olubi Mairumbi, Karin Betts, Luke Maamai Photo: Victor Arriola/ 'In Indigenous cultures around the world, blankets hold profound significance,' said Goyal, who contributed his own design. 'They are often intricately woven with traditional patterns and colors, representing a tribe's history, identity, and spiritual beliefs.' Goyal's blanket took inspiration from his repoussé metalwork, translating a gilded wall sculpture—based on a 17th-century Rajput manuscript called The Book of Dreams—into an embroidered textile layered with symbols of good fortune: the Gajaraja (Elephant King), Gajasimha (Elephant-Lion), blackbuck antelope, and parrots in a flowering tree. Other contributors to 'Wrapped in History' included Ralph Lauren, Tarun Tahiliani, Sabyasachi, Diane von Furstenberg, Johanna Ortiz, Ozwald Boateng, and the Navajo Nation, alongside India's craft communities and schools like Chanakya, whose women artisans stitched together a textile map of India using techniques drawn from the Deccan plateau to Assam. 'Craft has always evolved within contemporary frameworks,' Goyal noted. 'Textile has long led by this example.'
