Whats else can I say but, I was intrigued by this picture of the two naked ladies with sheep on their laps. I got introduced to this picture during a PowerPoint presentation by professor Chris Ling in my Sustainability and Community class.
The picture (to left by Howard Fry) was taken in protest to environmental concerns on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia as an example of community action for sustainability. My interest was peaked for two reasons. One, what was the protest about? Second, how do naked girls holding sheep helping to bring awareness to a protest other than 'sex sells'.
First, to solve this mystery of what is behind this photo, I googled Howard Fry. For more of his photos click the following link http://howard.frygallery.com/. I suggest the black and white section of his photo gallery site to view an alternate photograph of the two naked ladies with sheep. In fact I like the one on the site better versus the one you see now. Unfortunately, more photos did not bring me closer to the actual point of the 'protest' at hand. The only conclusion I can draw so far, is that Howard Fry is a unique photographer that can combine nakedness and the environment/nature in an eye pleasing way.
My second attempt to solve the mystery of the naked girls with sheep, I again googled "protests on salt spring island." Pay dirt! I found an January 23rd, 2001 article from the Vancouver Sun called 'Lady Godiva' protest assails Saltspring logging by Glenn Bohn.
This article explains the protests were against Texada Land Cooperation. Texada recently purchased approximately 5000 hectares (one-tenth of Salt Spring Island) from a German private land owner for $50 million. Texada immediately began to log (clear-cut) this land for new home development. This land is home to the largest remaining Garry Oak woodland in Canada as well as rare animals, insects and plants. Orca whales and porpoises frequent the island's bay and salmon spawn in its streams.
The community of Saltspring Island, lobbied governments, informed the media, held rallies and even locked themselves to logging trucks but their voices were not heard until lady protesters took their clothes off. Briony Penn, dressed as Lady Godiva wearing a wig & panties and rode a horse through the streets of downtown Vancouver accompanied with other bare-breasted women and protesters to raise awareness of Texada logging of Saltsprings.
Briony Penn has a PhD in Geography but her other attempts to raise awareness (as mention above) of the logging and destroyed ecosystems until she took her clothes off with others. This action resulted in a dozen new cameras, news paper photographers and reporters. Briony Penn later ran in the last federal election for the Liberal Party but was defeated in a close race by the by Conservative, Gary Lunn now Minister of Natural Resources.
You may ask, what is the significance of Lady Godiva? Lady Godiva rode the streets of Coventry of England to protest the greed and taxation that she felt was ruining her community. Briony Penn felt that Lady Godiva was a lovely metaphor to protest the logging of Texada.
What about the naked babes holding sheep? Well, like Briony Penn were of the community, protesters of Saltspring that wanted to raise awareness of the logging practices. A calender was made in order to raise money to buy back the private land from Texada (at a much higher price, of course). This calender was photographed by Howard Fry and includes the above picture. The inspiration for this calender came from the Women's Institute of Rysdale in Yorkshire, England, of the 1999 calendar showing female members (husbands with leukaemia) in the nude fundraising for leukaemia and lymphoma research.
For further more info, check out these links for the articles I read for this blog:
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