A collaboration with José Carlos Espinel
Exhibitions: A series of shows between November 2019 and January 2020 in Spain, including for the UN Climate Change Conference COP 25 in Madrid (2-13 Dec, 2019).
Coral bleaching is one of the most obvious environmental signs of climate change. More than 50% of the Great Barrier Reef has been bleached over the past decade. However, bleaching is not a straightforward process and occurs in cycles, with coral bleaching and then regaining its colour, which comes from the algae that lives commensally with it.
Bleaching pocillopora is a video projection and sculptural installation that plays back a series of bleaching cycles, drawn from Great Barrier Reef bleaching data, with each revival less than the last, until the coral ends up completely white.
The coral is made from plaster moulds based on real life coral. Photogrammetric underwater 3D scans of living pocillopora species were made into models that were 3D printed, made into moulds and used to cast the plaster.
The colour on the coral is projected from above via an algorithmically generated video. The palette derives from the 2019 Pantone Color of the Year, “Living Coral”.