In Conversation with John Dyer: Inspiring Change Through Art
Art can be an amazing thing: it can inspire emotion and ignite passion in any viewer. Late in 2018, Innova Art heard of an inspirational project underway from an artist who aims to change the way young people view the conservation of endangered species, environments and cultures around the world. Curious to find out more, eInnovation News had a conversation with John Dyer, founder of Last Chance to Paint. eInnovation News: What inspired the Last Chance to Paint project? John Dyer: In 2015 I worked on a ground breaking painting project with Amazon Indian Nixiwaka Yawanawá ’Spirit of the Rainforest' and this type of cultural and global exploration through painting is something that I believe has huge potential. Whilst putting together my new book ‘Painting the Colours of the World’ with the author Kate Dinn and Alan Titchmarsh, who wrote the foreword, it became obvious that the last chapter had to be forward looking - new projects and that it should build on my global painting experiences and ’Spirit of the Rainforest' I always have so many projects in my mind, so once I started to consider these it seemed logical to bracket them into one large project with a series of ‘chapters'. I was inspired many years ago by the work of Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001) who wrote The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Douglas also travelled with WWF zoologist Mark Carwardine and wrote a book ‘Last Chance to See’. I approached Mark, who agreed that ‘Last Chance to Paint’ was a great idea for the last chapter of my new book and the project has grown from that point. My work is studied at schools across the UK and beyond and ‘Last [...]









