Holocene Tapestries

Holocene

We are but a blink in the universe. A minimalist illustration of the solar system we call home.

Got to start somewhere! Drawn for Inktober's special hunter prompt. Copyright 2020 Kristen O’Keefe. All rights reserved. All images property of Kristen O’Keefe and are protected by copyright law. Resale, downloading, reproducing, printing, and comping of these images is illegal without permission of the artist

Megaloceros giganteus otherwise known as the Irish Elk, one of the largest deer species in the fossil record. Measuring 6.9 feet, with the largest antlers of any deer species, measuring 12 feet in width. Despite it’s name it was not exclusively native to Ireland, nor was it actually an elk. Most of the best and most complete specimens were found in Ireland, with some of the antlers winding up on the walls in medieval castles. Megaloceros lived during the Middle pleistocene to the early holocene 0.781 – 0.008 million years ago.

Vintage bootleg

The Wolves

Bon Iver Re: Stacks

In 1598 Dutch sailors landed on the shores of Maritius looking for supplies during an expedition to Indonesia, while on the island they encountered a large, odd looking, flightless bird. According to the surviving translations of that first account the birds were somewhat tasteless, leading to their discoverers initially calling them Walghvogel (Dutch for “tastelss” or “sickly” “bird”). The origin of the name Dodo is somewhat nebulous, but it’s possible that it may have it’s routes in the word Dodaars, meaning “fat-arse” or “knot-arse.”

This extinct canine roamed Americas and eastern Asia during the Pleistocene and Holocene epochs!

A brown woolly mammoth looks at the viewer. Has raised tusks, hairy coat, small eyes and ear and a large long trunk.

Illustration and photo-reconstruction of a woolly, or Siberian, mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius). This animal lived during the Pleistocene and into the early Holocene, and as such coexisted with humans. It was roughly the same size as a modern African elephant. Covered in thick hair, it was well adapted to the cold environment in which it lived, the tundra steppes of northern America, Europa and Asia.

Reconstruction of the extinct "diving goose," Chendytes lawi, a flightless dabbling duck from the Pleistocene to early Holocene of California.