Wildfire is a serious and
recurring problem in Thailand. Between 1985 and today, 92,106 wildfire
incidents have occurred, 95% of it manmade, damaging a total of 55,600
acres of priceless rainforest and agricultural
land. Firefighters are
also in short supply, often inadequately equipped. The result is an ever
increasing number of wildfires, from year to year. The Thai Forestry
department, in partnership with Caran D’Ache, created the Return of the
Ashes project in order to gather funds. All proceeds will go to
increasing the number of firefighters and supplying them with better
equipment with which to combat wildfires.
The Return of the Ashes project gathered ashes and cinders from trees
damaged by wildfire and transformed them into an charcoal pencil set.
The pencil cases were also made from fire-damaged trees that have
toppled and died. The branches from these dead trees were also put to
use. They were meticulously transformed into charcoal pencils, and then
packed. These limited edition, artisanal charcoal pencil sets were then
put on sale in Caran D’Ache shops, with all proceeds going to
firefighting division of the Thai Department of Forestry.
Poster
All the posters for the Return of the Ashes project were made using
different parts of the burnt tree, from bark, branch, leaf and ash.
These ingredients then underwent the printing process to form all the
elements seen on the poster.
Exhibition
The Return of the Ashes exhibition was created to inform the public
about the threat of wildfire in Thailand. To emphasize the threat, we
used different parts of the burnt tree as visual data in order to
communicate information, statistics and the awful consequences of
wildfire.