"By the late 21st century, the earth’s bee population was nearly decimated.  Many researchers gave the cause up for lost.  Manual pollination became a common practice across world agriculture, but the workforce was not able to keep up with the supply chain.  Produce shelves emptied, and so too did many plant species begin to disappear entirely.

An initiative was begun at the Institute for Fictional Genetics (IFG) to find alternative solutions to the pollination crisis.  A team of science fiction writers researched and constructed a core inspirational narrative as a basis for the project.  A think tank of genetic engineers and cartoonists was assembled to assess the narrative’s probability, adjust for accuracy, and then begin creating a solution.  The geneticists worked to isolate and combine such varied genetic information as the size and behaviors of bees and butterflies, the propagative abilities of fungi, the climbing physiology of geckos, and the communal mindset of prairie dogs.  Meanwhile, the cartoonists worked tirelessly to design an organism as small and cute as possible to maximize empathy from the general public, referencing pop-culture icons such as the Smurfs, troll dolls, and Pokemon.  After years of development, the Pollinators were born.

Thousands of Pollinator colonies were seeded in protected environments across the globe.  The Pollinators were able to adapt quickly to their new environments, climbing up flowering plants and dispersing pollen throughout the worlds’ ecosystems.  Their communal, “happy-village” mindset, along with universal adoration from the general public, kept their colonies healthy and protected.  Today, there is no natural space where a Pollinator colony cannot be found."

The Pollinators are an ongoing series of art toys, digitally sculpted in ZBrush Core and available for purchase through Shapeways.com