I was witnessing what amounted to the birth of art. If elephants could really paint flowers and trees, then they were, of course, in a different league. But I had a nasty feeling there was a catch in it somewhere, so when I was visiting Thailand this year I decided to find out the truth.
I knew that Hong was living at an elephant conservation centre up in the far north of the country and that I would not have time to reach it during my brief stay. But inquiries revealed there are now at least six elephant centres in Thailand where painting is done.
One of them, at Nong Nooch, was near enough for a brief visit. These centres originally developed because, 20 years ago, logging by elephants was outlawed in Thailand and all the domesticated elephants suddenly found themselves out of work.
Their future looked bleak and there was no hope of returning them to the wild. Then someone had the bright idea of setting up elephant sanctuaries where the animals could be shown to visitors for a small fee.
Out of this grew staged performances and, about eight years ago, the painting sessions. The centre I was visiting, the Nong Nooch Tropical Garden, is a large recreation park nine miles from the thriving seaside resort of Pattaya. In addition to its exotic tropical gardens and orchid nursery, it boasts an impressive theatre where Thai boxing and highly sophisticated local folklore shows are performed.
Next to this theatre there is a large, square arena for the daily elephant displays. These displays, it turned out, are far too reminiscent of old-fashioned circus acts, but they do differ in two important respects. First, each animal has its own personal keeper, whose whole life is devoted to his particular elephant. Second, much of the performance is designed to make the audience marvel at the skills of the elephants, rather than laugh at them as overgrown clowns. As part of the elephant show, I was able to watch three young female elephants painting pictures of botanical subjects and see for myself exactly how it was done.
So are these endearing mammals truly artistic? The answer, as politicians are fond of saying, is yes and no. Let me describe exactly what happens. A painting session begins with three heavy easels being wheeled into position. On each easel a large piece of white card 30in x 20in has been fixed underneath a strong wooden frame.
Each elephant is positioned in front of her easel and is given a brush loaded with paint by her mahout. He pushes the brush gently into the end of her trunk. Crowd pleasers: Tourists gasp as the animals paint detailed pictures in front of their eyes. The man then stands to one side of his animal's neck and watches intently as the brush starts to make lines on the card.
Then the empty brush is replaced by another loaded one, and the painting continues until the picture is complete. The paintings are then removed from their frames and offered for sale. They are quickly snapped up by people who have been astonished by what they have just witnessed. To most of the members of the audience, what they have seen appears to be almost miraculous. Elephants must surely be almost human in intelligence if they can paint pictures of flowers and trees in this way.
What the audience overlooks are the actions of the mahouts as their animals are at work. This oversight is understandable because it is difficult to drag your eyes away from the brushes that are making the lines and spots.
However, if you do so, you will notice that, with each mark, the mahout tugs at his elephant's ear. He nudges it up and down to get the animal to make a vertical line, or pulls it sideways to get a horizontal one. To encourage spots and blobs he tugs the ear forward, towards the canvas.
Close search. Do elephants like to Paint? Are they trained? When considering buying a painting at the Elephant Art Gallery know that: We are not re-sellers. We create every single painting directly with the elephants. We offer only genuine, original art painted by an elephant using its own volition. Every original painting is produced on quality art paper using quality acrylic paint. For our Special Portfolio and Gallery paintings, it is handmade paper. When seen in the wild, they appear like creatures from another world, and their size and grace are so humbling to a mere human.
It is near impossible not to be absolutely floored by the sight of a real life pachyderm, and what could be more astounding than watching a gentle elephant use his trunk to paint a picture of a flower? This encounter would surely be the most peaceful, beautiful experience one is likely to ever have. Under what circumstances would you come across an elephant painting a picture in the wild?
Well, if you find yourself in this rather bizarre situation, chances are said painting elephant is being held in captivity. Elephant tourism is extremely popular in Thailand, so much so that the native Asian elephant population has all but disappeared from the wild. Tourists from across the world flock to Thailand to have an experience unlike anything they could get at home.
Seeing a live elephant is often included as one of these experiences. The high intelligence of elephants is often credited with their ability to learn how to paint so effortlessly. However, just as an elephant in the wild would not choose to jump into a handstand , it is not likely they ever aspired to be a Pachyderm Picasso either. And like all good adults, these little elies were put to work! Further, the site explains that it took around a month to teach the elephants to learn to hold a brush with their trunks — they were a bit reluctant at first, but got the hang of it in no time!
Once this skill was mastered, they were ready to learn to dip their brushes into paint. While we cannot allege that Maesa utilizes these methods for training their Jumbo painters, this is a credible account of how elephants are traditionally trained to paint in the Thai tourism industry, provided thanks to the research performed by devoted elephant conservation organizations across Thailand.
Like elephants used in the elephant trekking industry, young elephants used for painting must be broken and experience the pain of the phajaan process. Select basic ads. Create a personalised ads profile. Select personalised ads. Apply market research to generate audience insights. Measure content performance. Develop and improve products. List of Partners vendors. By Anna Norris Anna Norris.
Anna Norris Mitchell is a writer, editor, and photographer who loves capturing nature through her camera lens.
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