9″ x 12″
Watercolor, pieces of trash, beads, acrylic paint, faux seaweed, paint pens, markers
In Collaboration with Taylor Hamblin, Assistant Professor of Social Studies Education, UW La Crosse

I grew up an hour away from Lake Winnebago and was  jealous of how much fun my friends with fancy lake houses would have in the summer.  It wasn’t until I went to college in Oshkosh that I knew that the Lake was sick. There are algae blooms that make the waters neon green and unsafe for swimming. The locals are warned no to swim in areas that have algae blooms because there are serious health risks to humans that swim in the lake and animals that drink from the water. The algae blooms  disrupt the aquatic flora and fauna and cause harm to their ecosystem. There are local efforts to keep the beaches clean, but the water is a larger issue that many local people feel hopeless about positively changing. There are research and preventative efforts made by organizations to keep the water clean but there needs to be more done to keep the lake clean and healthy for all the life that lives in and around it.