Compost Ecology ICAW 2024

Working with the theme of this year’s International Compost Awareness Week is “Compost… Nature’s Climate Champion,” I decided to focus on the cyclical nature of utilizing compost in our food system. The top of the poster shows a stylized stream of crops and other organic materials which are being fed into the compost piles below. These piles then flow into rows of soil on a farm, from which crops are being grown. At the top of the poster, the sky is grey and yellow, representing polluted air. The sky below, after the organic material is transformed into compost and laid into the fields, is blue and clear. Though the relationship between climate change and pollution are complexly correlated and composting will not simply reverse the damage that has been done, this poster attempts to artistically represent the environmental benefits of recycling our organic matter by composting. Climate change cannot be combatted by simply one method, but composting will certainly aid in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, increasing carbon sequestration, and overall creating a more sustainable food system.

The trophy is full of fruits and vegetables, which was intended to show the ‘rewards’ or ‘prizes’ of composting. The Earth and trophy are being held up by a pile of compost, which shows that compost (and soil health) can help to support humans’ required resources from the Earth, while mitigating environmental issues, especially relating to climate change. This is intended to represent how compost and holistic approaches to waste management can be the foundation upon which a sustainable system is built. The presence of both the crops and the compost/soil in front of the circular Earth is meant to represent the closed-system approach that compost can help create, where waste products can be recycled to offer more available resources. The compost/soil has a worm, springtail, and isopod living inside, representing the many organisms which use resources within the system to complete the composting process.

For my poster, I wanted to emphasize the ways that compost helps protect our planet from the ground up. The tree holding up our Earth represents how protecting the health of the soil and plants in our ecosystem can combat many of the issues that climate change is causing throughout the world. The roots reaching down into the ground, and the branches embracing the planet show how small changes in protecting planetary health can have massive impacts. Underground, I chose to draw some worms, slugs, and snails to showcase the work that these smaller organisms, including microorganisms such as nematodes and bacteria, do under the surface. Above ground, I included a bee to show the benefits that healthy soil and plant life has for native pollinators. For the lettering, I decided to write the word “compost” using items that can be found in a compost pile. Many of the letters show common food scraps, for example an orange peel, half a tomato, and a sprouted onion. Other letters show the essential workers in a compost pile, like the earthworm and the mushroom. The rest of the lettering is done in blue and green tones which mirror the colors of a happy and healthy Earth. I wanted to make my poster visually appealing, while also using images that could relay the importance of composting separately from the text on the poster. My goal was for people to see that something as simple as their leftovers could help protect this place we call our home.

For the International Compost Awareness Week poster, I decided to highlight common things that make a nutritious and organic compost great. The theme was ‘Compost Natures Climate Champion’ and to incorporate the theme into the poster, I had all the different materials that makes a great compost leading into one big compost that would turn into a luscious growing garden. Some of the materials on my poster are different fruits and vegetables, leaves, dead flowers, greasy cardboard pizza box, animal bones, fish bones, tea bags, coffee grinds, newspaper, cork, pinecones and most importantly water and oxygen. The garden that arises from the compost pile, made of all these different composted items, is bright and full of growing food showing that compost can help with waste reduction and limit natural resource use as it recycles nutrients into the soil, both important factors in fighting climate change.

The inspiration for my poster came from a desire to show the elements that compose good compost while showing the result. I used images from magazines to cut out images of vegetables that should be included in compost. These provide organic material which makes for a successful compost recipe. To complete the compost recipe, I included straw material which contains considerable amounts of carbon. I wanted to represent a good C:N ratio so I included images of straw with the images of vegetables along with animal manure which is productive for a good C:N ratio. Additionally, the mushroom was added on top of the soil to represent a healthy mycelium network. The trash cans in the corner symbolize avoiding excess landfill contributions. The lettering of this year’s theme was put on top of an image of nature to show the future that is possible by composting. Composting sequesters carbon from the air, makes soil more fertile, and avoids excess additions to carbon in the atmosphere.

This poster depicts the dynamic correlation between plants and extensive root systems, underscoring the importance of compost in this relationship. The main idea of this poster is just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it's not important. I drew with pencil (there may be lingering evidence) and traced with pen for visibility and permanence. I chose not to use color so the viewer's attention would be drawn to the complexity of the roots and the word ‘Compost’ they trace in the lower portion. It's intentionally hidden and entangled in the roots of the tree because this is the nature of compost in soil—intrinsic and seamlessly interwoven. The poster subtly suggests that compost is everywhere and the opportunity for recycling organic residuals should be equally abundant.

My poster is displaying the concept of compost as nature’s climate champion. There are fruit and vegetable scraps, leaves, worms, and some bugs, showing some healthy components of good compost. Food scraps and plant matter help add nutrients to the soil when they are broken down, creating a great habitat for new plants to grow. Compost helps fight climate change as it improves carbon sequestration, prevents methane emissions, allows for more food growth, and keeps the earth clean!

My poster concept plays on the theme of the competition: Compost... Nature's Climate Champion. My poster depicts compost winning the competition against recycling and trash since composting is much better for the environment than the other two. I got the idea for this concept because I saw an advertisement for the upcoming Olympics and immediately pictured a compost pile on top of the podium. 

To represent compost as nature’s climate champion I chose to draw polar bears and a tree frog. These animals and their habitats are symbols of climate change because they stand to lose the most. The frog and polar bears are all happy because of the benefits compost provides to the climate. I also included humans because we are the ones that make the compost and see most of the benefits. To ensure that the compost was still the star of this poster I drew it in layers with different feedstocks at each layer. Starting from the bottom and working our way up there are wood chips, grass clippings, dry leaves, food scraps, manure, and finished compost.

The Ring Leader pictures Compost in the boxing ring, dominating the climate change era. Compost, with its valuable microorganisms and diversity of nutrients, acts as a master boxer reducing greenhouse gasses. Emanating a powerful stance, the boxer fights against water runoff as well as capturing water for a hefty punch. Climate Change faces no chance of survival in the ring, as the increasing land fertility compost throws at them proves too much. A foul blow from Compost, Climate Change is down; 1, 2, 3! Compost proves victorious, leading our future earth to an insatiable win.

In the poster I wanted to show that compost as a soil amendment saves food waste from going to landfill and producing ammonium, can increase soil microbe and species biodiversity. I showed that by including rotting fruit as food waste being added back to the soil rather than going to landfill, and long roots that extend from a flower in the shape of the world. The long roots are meant to represent carbon sequestration that helps offset carbon emissions of plants but also fungal and microbial associations that benefit soil health that can be aided by compost. The world made from roots was supposed to be a fun way to express compost as a climate champion. The rotting fruit also have some leaves next to them to show both a carbon and nitrogen input that microbes will breakdown into compost. The soil microbes and mites are supposed to represent how compost helps with biodiversity of the soil with soil structure and organic matter that Is food for different soil arthropods. I only did mites just because I ran out of space for invertebrates or other soil arthropods. I put a flower and a happy sun to show that compost helped return nutrients that can grow edible crops and plants and minimize gases that would be wasted to the soil rather than into the atmosphere.

My poster displays a compost pile including food scraps such as an apple, banana, and eggshell that is sitting atop of the bottom heal of the Earth. Along the lower half of my globe there is both a carrot and pepper that hug the perimeter. The carrot is super strong and happy because it is a part of the compost mix that will continue to be nature’s climate champion. All food features included are a representation of food scraps being a common feedstock involved in compost. Above and below the Earth is the theme “Compost…Nature’s Climate Champion”. The letters feature earth tones such as deep red, green, blue, and a burnt orange. All together my poster highlights the use of compost as an environmentally friendly method of food waste.

This poster shows how overtime the products and foods that we use can be turned into compost, a sustainable method that lessens the load on landfills and improves soil health and plant growth by converting organic waste into a useful resource. Some things that we can use to compost are fruits and vegetables, coffee grounds, tea bags, eggshells, leaves, plant trimmings and much more. In return, we get compost, a rich, dark matter that is useful for enhancing fertility and soil structure. Compost is a great organic fertilizer because it has a balanced mix of nutrients, such as potassium, phosphorus, nitrogen, and several micronutrients.

Compost… Nature’s climate champion! This poster depicts the benefits that compost has for soils and the plants that grow in them. The compost is in the #1 trophy, showing its success in achieving good soil and plant health. The roots are used to show the good health of the plants (healthy plants promote a healthy climate!). Overall, I hoped to make my concept simple and easy to understand.

My compost awareness poster for International Compost Awareness Week emphasizes the theme “Compost… Nature’s Climate Champion” through the podium and trophy elements. I decided to illustrate the fact that compost is an effective climate mitigator by placing a pile of compost at the top of the podium with a first-place trophy. I wanted the meaning of this poster to be very accessible to onlookers, which is why I made this artistic decision. I was going to add other mitigation methods, such as recycling or anaerobic digestion, to the second and third place spots on the podium but decided against it as I didn’t want to give the impression that these strategies aren’t beneficial to preventing climate change; there are a lot of important components that can be implemented to mitigate climate change impacts. I also didn’t want to include any negative connotations in this poster, resulting in my decision to leaving second and third place spots empty. It is up to the viewer to fill in these blanks with what they believe earn the two remaining spots on the podium. I also added the natural element of trees in the background to further express the growth that compost promotes. There are lots of beneficial aspects of compost which all culminate to crown it nature’s climate champion.

This poster has a couple of different techniques and materials. The element that took the most time to create was the compost itself. I had an idea where I wanted the compost to look as alive and dimensional as possible. Through some trial and error I figured out that with enough force, a white colored pencil shows up underneath an oil pastel as a form of impression. I thought this technique would be a great way to illustrate the living, changing, dynamic process we know compost to be. The poster’s background was created with more pastels originally drawn as a floral mass but became blurred together to allow more focus on the compost trophy.

This poster emphasizes the role that compost has in keeping our earth healthy. The soil overlap implies that soil is everywhere and has a direct relationship to our planet and its overall productivity. One element of compost that is well-known is food scraps. For this reason, happy fruits and vegetables are surrounding the earth in hopes of being composted!

The compost poster on the next page was inspired by my desire to try drawing on the iPad using a digital pencil, as I have never drawn digitally. I have tried using the drawing feature here and there on my own time, but I wanted to use it to create original art for this poster. Both the pieces of art seen below were drawn using all the different pen and highlighter options to create gradients of light to make them look more realistic. It was very hard to do and I had to go back and fix things to make it seem more realistic. Hands are also deceptively difficult to draw so I restarted at least 5 times and still the shape seems a bit off. Lastly, I uploaded it to Apple Preview, which allows you to edit the digital drawing. I used it to get rid of the white background so it was just the object I drew and the rest was transparent, and I put it into the poster. To cut out the background and make it transparent, I had to draw lines around the image so it wouldn’t cut out any of the actual art. I included the rhyme in the top right corner because when I first heard of compost, it was from my middle school teacher and I never forgot it: “In the garden, composting with glee, turning waste into soil, naturally”, so I thought I would include it. Overall I’m really happy about how this project came together. If I had to add anything, I would try to add more art, or maybe even make the background of some of the panels on the poster the art I created. I had so many ideas, but I didn’t want to overcomplicate it and I am very proud of the art I drew. I’m really glad I got the chance to do this project digitally, as I explored a new realm of art I previously had rarely ever explored.

Initially I had come up with a design that just involved tying a bunch of source materials to healthy soil and plants, but that was before learning about the theme. The concept of compost being a climate champion made me alter my idea a bit. I still wanted to incorporate source materials for compost and show how it contributes to active soils and vigorous plants, but now I had to represent composts’ relationship with climate. I thought initially of making a plant that had the stems close around climatic events like rain, snow, flooding, high heat, intense UV rays, and stormy winds. When designing the poster, I knew I wanted to represent CO2 as that is a huge player in climate change and healthy soils & plants can help sequester carbon from the atmosphere, that’s where the idea of using bubble hit me. The arrows indicated the use of source materials for healthy compost and how that can help mitigate the effects of climate change and extreme weather patterns. The background was a gradient representing soil all the way to the troposphere, where weather occurs. I wanted to include cardboard, leaf litter, twigs/bramble, paper, eggshells, fruit/vegetable waste, grass clippings, and some sort of animal for both the manure and whole animal composting properties. I think the poster provides knowledge about the mechanisms of compost as well as the benefits in terms of climate remediation.

This paragraph depicts an apple core which represents food waste and scraps that are able to be composted. There are then arrows from the apple core pointing towards a compost pile. I represented the compost by adding vegetables in the pile in order to convey that it is not just a pile of dirt. There are then two more arrows between the compost pile and the Earth. The Earth has a smiley face drawn onto it and a flexed arm. The smiley face and the flexed arm show that the compost contributes to a happier and healthier Earth. Furthermore, the flexed arm ties in the word "champion" written in the title because I often correlate that word to athletic competitions. The background of the poster is colored in two shades of green because green is often correlated with environmentally friendly. Lastly, the outlines that separate different parts of the poster are gold because champions win gold medals. For this poster, I used Powerpoint. For the images I used the "scribble" shape feature and colored in the shapes.