We never know who our net Puffin West friend/Puffling will be. We have ben able to give muralist and art activist Roger Peet, of Portland Oregon, a small grant to do a mural in Oakland in the diverse Laurel Neighborhood as part of his endangered species project. He will crate a mural about the Grizzly Bear. Grizzlies are featured on the California State Flag but have been EXTINCT in the state for decades! His piece will be used as a centerpiece of local efforts to move forward on restoring this epic creature to the Sierra Nevada Mountains where it once ruled for so long. If you have followed PFW you know that we also supported the Backbone Campaign with respect to the protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Sioux Indian Protest known as “Water is Life”. PFW has supported the Sioux/Lakota Indians for many years and you can read about our work with the Lakota Consortium and Conservatory in our Grant Archives as well as the Grant award that was just given to them.
“Roger Peet is an artist and printmaker based in Portland, Oregon. His current work in graphic art addresses issues of extinction, biocultural diversity and environmental disaster with an emphasis on conflict between culture and nature. He is a founding member of the Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative, a group of North American artists producing socially and environmentally engaged works. He creates his imagery by hand, using analog methods of paper and film cutting, linoleum block-printing and stencil to create emotionally expressive, information-rich narrative images. He is also a muralist, writer, installation artist, and puppeteer. He has organized international collaborative printmaking projects and installations, developed artistic tools in the service of conservation, and collaborated with activists, artists and scientists across the globe” (from the Portland Art Museum). He leads theVenter for Biological Diversity’s national endangered species mural project, which increases awareness and appreciation for endangered species through a series of paintings around the country. Peet is known for his project IN//APPROPRIATE, which explores political correctness and cultural appropriation, as well as art about conservation and environmental issues. He leads www.biologicaldiversity.org The painting of the Dakota skipper butterfly at Standing Rock is the 10th mural in the project. In addition to the pipeline’s threat to people’s lives, water and land, it will also threaten the Dakota skipper butterfly, which has been protected under the Endangered Species Act since 2014. “The Fish and Wildlife Service basically signed a permission slip for energy transfer partners to destroy this butterfly habitat, which is federally protected. It’s just one more example of, ‘you’re not supposed to do this,'” Peet tells WW. “The butterfly is a small thing. It’s not a very dramatic creature. It’s about an inch long, but it’s part of the great community of life that exists on the plains.” We will post his GRIZZLY when completed. 
