Original artwork description:

A recent look through old photos of a holiday on Heron Island (Marine Research Station) in The Barrier Reef was the start of my inspiration for this series of artworks, and then I went on to research how the World's reefs are becoming stressed due to global warming combined with water pollution and over fishing. When coral dies it turns white and expels symbiotic coloured algae called zooxanthellae that live in its tissues, photosynthesize, and provide their food. Without these colored zooxanthellae, the coral is left in a “bleached state” and will eventually die.

This is the first piece in the series.

I started looking at coral shapes, and the marine life in reefs, and also at microscopic images of plankton, reef vegetation and coral.

The individual cells are all kinds of incredible shapes which are more like images from a science fiction movie than anything I can liken them to that I've seen!

I got carried away doodling shapes to cut out and spent days doing just that until I had amassed a desk full of white card pieces layered and stuck together with tiny foam board dividers and plinths.
I experimented placing the different pieces together and photographing them to see what combinations look best together.
I often went back to cutting shapes to refine them until I was happy with my collection and could construct the final artwork.

The result is a striking white dimensional relief design revealing individual coral, plant and plankton like shapes on closer inspection, and casting interesting shadows depending on the direction of the light.

Materials used:

White card and foam board in a white deep box frame glazed with perspex

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