Tangled up in Blues: Conservation through Community

Working in partnership with the Island Recreation Association and sponsored by the Community Foundation of the Lowcountry, local artist Stella-lee Anderson led an art endeavor weaving ecology, history and art together in one community art making project. This Community Creates project was designed to engage the community in an art project dedicated to endangered and extinct plant and animal life from the coastal waters of South Carolina. Tying in the local history through the art forms of batik and indigo dying, we believe that this installation is a tribute to two of the most special components to our Island, its history and ecology. Hopefully this large scale installation will inspire all of us to take responsibility for protecting the local flora and fauna.

At-Risk Species Featured in the Installation

• Lined Seahorse –  Vulnerable due to pollution, loss of habitat
• Red Knot – Endangered due to disruption of resting and feeding time by humans and dogs during migration stopovers
• Carolina Pygmy Sunfish – Threatened in South Carolina due to habitat destruction and loss due to development and pollution
• Knobbed Whelk – Threatened by bycatch in fishing industry
• Sarracenia Pitcher Plant – Threatened by habitat destruction and flooding
• Great White Shark – Vulnerable due to overfishing
• Tri-Colored Bat – Vulnerable due to white nose fungus
• West Indian Manatee – Vulnerable due to poaching, boat collisions, red tide
• Monarch Butterfly – Vulnerable due to herbicides, gmo crops, loss of habitat
• Green Sea Turtle – Endangered due to habitat loss due to development, egg poaching, being caught in fishing nets
• Loggerhead Sea Turtle – Vulnerable due to habitat loss due to development, egg poaching, being caught in fishing nets
• Wood Stork – Threatened due to habitat loss due to development, human disruption
• Piping Plover – Near Threatened due to nesting and resting habitat disruption
• Cow Nose Stingray – Threatened from bycatch
• Robust Redhorse – Endangered due to habitat loss and disturbance of breeding areas
• Bald Eagle – Formerly Endangered but populations made comeback with conservation regulations
• Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle – Critically Endangered due to habitat loss, pollution, oil spills, shrimp nets
• Roseate Spoonbill – Formerly Endangered due to plume hunting, populations made a comeback with conservation regulations
• Blueback Herring – Vulnerable due to habitat loss, overfishing, habitat degradation
• Scalloped Hammerhead Shark – Endangered due to overfishing, poaching for fins
• American Alligator – Formerly Endangered due to hunting and habitat loss, populations have made a comeback due to conservation regulations
• Atlantic Sturgeon – Near Threatened due to overfishing
• Northern Long Eared Bat – Near Threatened due to white nose syndrome
• Eastern Black Rail – Threatened due to habitat loss, sea level rise, severe weather
• Finback Whale – Vulnerable due to illegal hunting, ship collisions
• Swallow Tailed Kite – Endangered in South Carolina due to habitat destruction
• North Atlantic Right Whale – Endangered due to ship collisions
• Short Nosed Sturgeon – Endangered due to bycatch, pollution, habitat loss and degradation
• Macgillvrays Seaside Sparrow – Vulnerable due to sea level rise and loss of habitat
• Pondberry – Endangered due to habitat loss to deforestation
• Rough Leaved Loosestrife – Endangered due to habitat loss and destruction
• Leatherback Sea Turtle – Endangered due to predation in immaturity, hunting
• American Oystercatcher – Formerly Endangered but population increasing due to conservation efforts
• Black Capped Petrel – Endangered due to habitat loss, human disturbance to nesting areas
• Frosted Elfin Butterfly -Threatened due to pesticides and GMOs
• American Chafseed – Endangered due to habitat loss and destruction
• American Mink – Threatened in South Carolina due to habitat loss and pesticides
• Eastern Least Tern – Threatened in South Carolina due to overhunting and tidal changes
• Pitcher Plant – Endangered due to habitat loss and destruction
• Spotted Turtle – Endangered due to habitat loss and destruction
• Sea Beach Amaranth – Threatened due to tidal changes, habitat loss and degradation due to development
• Sea Whip – Vulnerable due to dredging material, fish trawlers
• Phosphorescence – Threatened due to pollution
• Marsh Periwinkle – Threatened due to loss of habitat and predators
• Cannonball Jellyfish – Populated
• Moon jellyfish – Populated
• Bottlenose Dolphin – Threatened by bycatch, coastal development and environmental degradation

Artist Bios
Stella-lee Anderson (Artist and Project Lead) has been an artist her whole life, working in different mediums ranging from pen and paper, painting, clay to sculpture made from trash and found objects.  She has lived on Hilton Head Island for 11 years, moving here from the Pacific Northwest.  Much of her inspiration comes spontaneously. Anderson loves lines and translating them on paper. Her technique is to, as much as possible, draw without looking at the paper. This allows her eyes and hand to communicate exactly what she sees. Creating a more authentic representation of what is seen.

Dawn Brut (Naturalist) is the Curator of Education at the Coastal Discovery Museum. She is originally from Pittsburgh, PA but has lived in the south (first North Carolina now South Carolina) since 2004. Dawn has a Secondary Biology Teacher Certification and a degree in Biology and Art from Thiel (pronounced Teal) College in PA. She was previously the Environmental Education and School Program Coordinator at the Don Lee Center in NC for 8 years. Dawn joined the Coastal Discovery Museum staff in February 2013 and creating, coordinating, and leading school group & youth experiences is her primary responsibility at the Museum. Other responsibilities include facilitating teacher workshops, live animal care, creating & updating educational programs and displays for Museum guests, and training education docents. Dawn was also a member of the Hilton Head Island Sea Turtle Team for 5 years and is a Master Naturalist.

Carlos Chacon (Naturalist) was born and raised in Costa Rica.  At age 12, Carlos started volunteering for various nature-related organizations. His fascination with nature led him to study Tropical Biology at the University of Costa Rica.  After graduating in 1996, Carlos began working as a nature guide, since then, he has been leading nature trips. Carlos has lead hundreds of trips through the Rain Forest and other environments of Central America; these have varied from general natural history to bird watching, butterfly watching, as well as whale watching along both coasts of Central America. Through his work in Central America, Carlos has led tours for the World Wildlife Fund, Linbdlad Expeditions, Mountain Sobek Travel, Tauck Tours, Thompson Family Adventures and several other international travel companies. In 2000, Carlos moved to Hilton Head Island, his wife’s home.  Since moving to the Lowcountry, Carlos has worked as a kayak guide in the marshes of Hilton Head Island and as an Alligator tour guide in the Sea Pines Forest Preserve. In 2007, Carlos received a M.S. in Earth and Environmental Resources Management from the University of South Carolina.   In 2005 Carlos joined the Coastal Discovery Museum as the Manager of Natural History. As the naturalist at the Coastal Discovery Museum, Carlos conducts numerous nature programs on diverse topics and manages the Karen Wertheimer Butterfly Enclosure. Carlos resides in Bluffton with his wife and two sons, fifteen year-old David and thirteen year-old Marco.

Hank D. Herring (Batik) was born in Rose Hill, North Carolina and currently resides in Beaufort, SC where he is the owner of the Green Herring Art and Framing Studio. Hank learned about art at an early age from watching and being instructed by artistic family members and school art programs. He won numerous science fair awards in school by using wood and metal as his medium. He completed his apprenticeship as a machinist before leaving high school. After high school, Hank enlisted in the Marine Corps for a twenty year career. Working in the machinist field allowed him to learn more creative ways to manipulate metals, plastic, glass and composite materials into art. He learned art skills from artisans and craftsmen in every place he was stationed or visited. Hank continually shows his passion for helping the community and the arts through mentoring programs, public events, and forums. Hank has mentored in public and private schools. He served as a teaching artist for the Kennedy Centers Teaching Artist Program and the Low Country Arts Integration Project with the Beaufort County, South Carolina School District. He served as a board member of the South Carolina Arts Alliance (SCAA) and as a consultant on local arts organizations’ special projects. Hank’s work has been featured in museums and galleries throughout the United States, to Canada, Great Britain and Ireland. He uses cultural symbols to create wooden stamps for working in batik, print making, quilting, and ceramics. He uses the cultural stamps for teaching educational standards in schools, demonstrating and instructing at art events with youth, physically challenged and senior groups. “I believe, art should stir the soul and ignite the imagination”. “I’m just passing it forward, it is not mine to keep. I’m paying back what was invested in me, hoping the return is worthy of my investors”.

Margaret Pickett (Indigo), or Peggy as she likes to be called, is a graduate of the University of Maryland and a former teacher who spent 20 years working in museum education in Virginia’s historic triangle—Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown.  In 1999 she became an independent Living History Interpreter researching and developing documented programs based on the lives of two prominent 17^th century Virginia women.  Since moving to South Carolina she has added two 18^th century South Carolina women—Eliza Lucas Pinckney and Dorothy Sinkler Richardson—and one 16^thcentury Spanish settler from Santa Elena—Marina de Lara—to her repertoire.  Peggy is the co-director of Pickett Educational Resources and is the co-author of The European Struggle to Settle North America Colonizing Attempts by England, France and Spain: 1521 – 1608.  Her latest book Eliza Lucas Pinckney Colonial Plantation Manager and Mother of American Patriots 1722 – 1793 was published in July of 2016.