Under the See: a new chapter

In 2022 I built a dugong out of fishing nets and placed people on the ocean floor with her. It was the first work in a series I called Under the See – installations that ask what it means to really look at the world beneath the waves, not through a screen but from inside it.

That piece was about plastic pollution and the fragile threads connecting our lives to the animals we share this planet with. It was shown at BACC as part of Tangled, a group exhibition with marine conservation projects across Thailand. I got tangled in the nets myself while building it. So did the visitors (and it was kind of intentional).

I have been working my way through this series ever since. Each work asks a different question about the ocean: understanding the context, the systems that interact and about what we might do differently.

It started as a dream about how I could make art with a more direct purpose, combining it with the work I do as a regenerative designer. Artificial reef sculptures captured my imagination ever since I was introduced to Celia Gregory whilst facilitating Ecosystem Restoration Design for Gaia Education. This next chapter is the most complex and ambitious project to date, thanks to looking at it through a systems thinking lens. Part artwork, part ecosystem restoration, part open-source community toolkit.

So this next chapter is really exciting – it also happens to be evolving into the most complex and the most ambitious project to date (thanks to looking at it from a systems thinking lens). Part artwork, part ecosystem restoration interaction, part open-source community toolkit.

I reached out to Dr Rahul Mehrotra – Research Director at Aow Thai Marine Ecology Center, to explore how to deploy the sculptures. Dr Mehrotra has led marine conservation work in Thailand since 2012 including coral reef restoration and plastics research, so he really is walking library on this topic – and the best collaborator I could possibly ask for. 

Here is what we know. Healthy reefs in the Gulf of Thailand are still spawning. The coral larvae exist. What they need is somewhere to land and grow. Most reef restoration work right now is focused on cloning – taking fragments of old corals, propagating them, replanting. It is faster, but the individuals being cloned are genetically old, spawned decades ago, before the seas got this warm. They are not surviving the bleaching events. What ATMEC has observed in the field – and what this project will help put on scientific record – is that genetically new individuals, recent natural recruits, are the ones making it through.

So the work is simple in concept: design a structure that gives those new individuals somewhere to settle, next to a healthy reef, and let them grow. The structures will be deployed in the Gulf of Thailand.

But I also want to go further. I want to create a design that can be open source. So that people who care about their local reefs – anywhere in the world, without specialist equipment or scientific training – are able to recreate this AR, deploy and know they are doing it in a way that is grounded in real evidence. That is my intention for this blueprint.

The vision is for an exhibition to bring all of this to life. Sculptures you can touch. Models showing the design process. An immersive installation – fabric, light, sound – that puts you inside a coral reef the way the Dugong installation puts you on the ocean floor. Short films from ATMEC’s fieldwork. A conversation with Dr Rahul about what he has seen and why it matters. And an honest look at where the science points and what we are trying to do about that.

So, I’m in the process of research, planning and designing. You can follow the project as it develops by subscribing to my mailing list here!