The Age of the World… in Art
I was in Chicago speaking at the What’s Next Baby Boomer Summit last week and heard a tremendous talk about the world’s population from Greg O’Neill, the Director of the National Academy on an Aging Society. In addition to startling facts about the aging of the US population – did you know that between 2000 and 2010 there was a nearly 50% growth in people between the ages of 55 and 64? – Greg included images of sculptures made by Mathieu Lehanneur (click on #36 “Demographic Jars”). The artist represented different countries’ populations through three-dimensional sculptures and brought to life the various age charts we’ve seen over the years.
The visceral impact of seeing these shapes and then thinking through the implications is unsettling. Even the artist acknowledges this effect in his statement: “Age of the World is opening a perspective designed to freak us all out.”
What’s unnerving is how much history can be understood by looking at the shapes of these objects. For example, WWII finishes and the US sees a giant explosion of population, and we can see the booms and busts in the Russian population from its participation in two World Wars.
And what does this tell us as we look to the future? Mexico, Egpyt and Iran are having a huge surge in the youngest members of its population which will likely create changes in those countries and those around them. And in the US, we see the continued “pig in a python” effect of the baby boomer generation as those nearly 80 million individuals start turning 65 this year.
The health of these individuals, and, ultimately, the health of the country, will depend upon our ability to make choices and shape incentives that keep each of us engaged socially, physically active, eating healthy, and challenging our intellect. There is much this cohort can do to keep productive and add back to society by staying of sound body and mind.
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March 30th, 2010 at 10:57 am
I am a gerontologist working with older adults about the issues of health, wellness and brain fitness. It is hard to get community leaders to understand the changing demographics. The bar graphs and pie charts just don’t cut it. This art work is very amazing. Thanks for sharing.
March 30th, 2010 at 12:18 pm
The picture really does the job. It is kind of scary looking at what countries are “young” or “top heavy”.
March 31st, 2010 at 6:35 pm
I was moved by the images as well … as a collector of sculpture and as someone focused on the baby boomer generation, the visuals are doubly meaningful to me.
March 31st, 2010 at 6:49 pm
Way cool graphics/sculptures! Would be even more meaningful if the levels were color-coded by stage of life: children, child-bearing/working age, retired. And if they were scaled to reflect the relative sizes of their population. The shapes of India and China may affect the world more than the effect of Egypt, even though Egypt looks like it’s growing fast.
May 1st, 2010 at 12:57 am
What an amazingly clever idea. I love it!
Show us more! What does China look like?
May 3rd, 2010 at 8:18 am
Mary Jo -
Here’s a link to the population pyramid for China as of 2005:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/China_population_pyramid_2005.png
Thanks,
Steven