Topic: Dog rescue from high-kill shelters.
I love dogs. I have two beautiful girls and I would die for them. But unlike my angels a lot of dogs can’t find forever homes when they’re puppies. Some dogs get abandoned when their owners move, or die, or just get tired of the dog. Those dogs end up in animal shelters. If they are lucky, they get to a humanitarian shelter that will take care of them for as long as they’re there. But some shelters are way crueler, and they “euthanize” the dogs that can’t find homes for a long time. Kill shelters are not intentionally evil. What makes them good is that they will accept any animal, without restrictions of age, behavior, etc. and there is no appointment needed to surrender a pet. However, this creates overpopulation in shelters and they solve it by killing off the animals that are least likely to get adopted. There are several volunteer organizations that adopt death row dogs from high kill shelters and try to find them foster or forever homes. But they don’t have the personal, the funds, or enough public awareness to save all dogs that are unfairly sentenced to an early death. Moreover, a lot of people prefer to buy pure bred dogs, which is ok for the most part, but it becomes a problem when people try to illegally profit from that. There are a lot of unlicensed “backyard” breeders that turn their dogs into puppy machines. Not only does this create a lot of puppies with mutations that they can’t profit from that end up in those shelters, but the breeder will often dump his female in a shelter when she becomes disabled from excessive breeding and birthing. There is no need for more than a few licensed breeders when there are so many perfectly good, loving, dogs in shelters.
With my T-shirt design I want to spread awareness of high kill shelters, and convince people to adopt, not shop.
I love dogs. I have two beautiful girls and I would die for them. But unlike my angels a lot of dogs can’t find forever homes when they’re puppies. Some dogs get abandoned when their owners move, or die, or just get tired of the dog. Those dogs end up in animal shelters. If they are lucky, they get to a humanitarian shelter that will take care of them for as long as they’re there. But some shelters are way crueler, and they “euthanize” the dogs that can’t find homes for a long time. Kill shelters are not intentionally evil. What makes them good is that they will accept any animal, without restrictions of age, behavior, etc. and there is no appointment needed to surrender a pet. However, this creates overpopulation in shelters and they solve it by killing off the animals that are least likely to get adopted. There are several volunteer organizations that adopt death row dogs from high kill shelters and try to find them foster or forever homes. But they don’t have the personal, the funds, or enough public awareness to save all dogs that are unfairly sentenced to an early death. Moreover, a lot of people prefer to buy pure bred dogs, which is ok for the most part, but it becomes a problem when people try to illegally profit from that. There are a lot of unlicensed “backyard” breeders that turn their dogs into puppy machines. Not only does this create a lot of puppies with mutations that they can’t profit from that end up in those shelters, but the breeder will often dump his female in a shelter when she becomes disabled from excessive breeding and birthing. There is no need for more than a few licensed breeders when there are so many perfectly good, loving, dogs in shelters.
With my T-shirt design I want to spread awareness of high kill shelters, and convince people to adopt, not shop.
Research- I started to work by looking up several topics that I felt had to do with my theme. It was mostly things like “kill shelters”, “humane society”, “dog rescue”, “dogs” etc. I created a moodboard on Pinterest and gathered all of the images I found inspiring there. I also read a little more about what causes overpopulation is shelters that would cause them to have to kill dogs to make room, and came to the conclusion that backyard breeding is one of the main causes. I also looked at some of the existing designs for humane shelters and activists, and found that a dog paw is a very popular symbol for this kind of cause.
after some more research, I figured money is one of the biggest causes for kill shelters to exist. Some of the photos I found made me really sad and I wanted to convey this sense of urgency and desperation in my design.
after some more research, I figured money is one of the biggest causes for kill shelters to exist. Some of the photos I found made me really sad and I wanted to convey this sense of urgency and desperation in my design.
sketches in Illustrator
Final design- My final design is an hourglass, at the top there’s a dog paw, which is a symbol commonly associated with humane shelters, humane organizations, and rescue. The paw on top is dissolving and is trickling down, like sand in an hourglass normally would. However, it turns into coins halfway through, and falls into a pile of money. The dissolving pay signifies the dying dogs. Their time is running out. The money represents the main reason this is happening to them- greed. People breed dogs illegally to make money, and with that they create overpopulation is shelters. There, the money and hourglass come into play again. Shelters are forced to “euthanize” dogs after a certain amount of time as they don’t have the means to support all of them. I tied it all in with the writing “we are running out of time”. I used “we” instead of “dogs” or “they” to make the viewer feel a personal connection and maybe responsibility for what is happening to the poor dogs. It could either be interpreted as “we” meaning the dogs and the people, or as a plea in the first person from the dogs.
