Michael Hall

The Disappearing sea

BY Michael Hall
MEDIUM Oil on Canvas

This abstract piece was loosely based on a satellite photograph of the Aral Sea in central Asia. Once the fourth largest lake (inland sea) in the world, it began to shrink in the 1960’s as the water from the two rivers that drain into it were diverted for irrigation projects. Once covering an area of over 26,000 square miles, it now covers an area about one-tenth of its original size! What was once a large body of water is now mostly desert! Aside from the abstract beauty of the photograph that provided the inspiration for this painting, it was my intent to create something that would exemplify the negative and sometimes irreversible effects humans can have on their environment. All too often we fail to realize that our natural resources are not limitless and the shrinking of the Aral Sea shows that despite what we think, there is a limit to the planet’s resources!