Initial Ideas

Sacred Animals

• Recently I have been interested in drawing animal caricatures, so I was keen to try and find a point of research based around animals.
• I started researching into sacred animals, and other animals that are worshiped in some kind of way on our planet.
• Pigs, Snakes, Tiger, Cattle, Elephant, Monkey, Wolf, Dog, Goat, Horse... These are all sacred/worshiped animals, and the list goes on depending on the religion and the culture.
• Indian cultures are well known for having a lot of animal worship within their religions, so is Egypt, towns in Egypt often had their own local scared animals that they would worship.
• Animal worship often comes from the idea that gods represent themselves on earth in the form of an entire animal species.
• I though about maybe producing illustration in response to a country or culture and their appropriate animals of worship.

These are some good quotes I found whilst researching:

• "We share our planet with all kinds of amazing animals, but a few species have become particularly significant within our cultures and traditions."
• "Whether we adore, admire, fear or respect these animals, each has come to represent an important aspect of humanity and our relationship with the planet" 

Potential Products

Retail and packaging was my area of interest, I thought about the sorts of products I would aim towards creating, and ones that could be applied to an animal related theme are:

• Beer cans
• Beer mats
• Skateboards
• T shirts and Clothing
• Bottles
• I phone cases
• Key rings
• Plastic cups
• Tea packaging
• Sauce bottles
• Paper cups

National Animals

I briefly looked at national animals, every country has a animal that represents the country. I didn't find anything interesting about these, there was nothing significant about why each country had that animal. The UK's animal was a lion?? I guess this supports ideas about how important animals are, but there was nothing to research further from this. I preferred the ideas of sacred animals and animal worship - not just animals that represent a country (on paper).