Last Updated on February 5, 2022, 10:39 PM | Published: February 5, 2022
OKLAHOMA CITY (Free Press) — One of the most pressing and concerning ecological issues of our time is one that Oklahomans may never encounter directly.
Most of the coral reefs within the oceans all around the world are dying, becoming “bleached” and desolate by excessively high and rising temperatures and chemical pollution.
The reefs are one of the most integral parts of marine life and the greater ocean ecosystem, variously providing food, shelter, and refuge for roughly 25% of all the world’s marine life, and a dying coral means potentially devastating repercussions across every link of the food chain and environment.
Of course, being entirely land-locked and about as far away from any ocean coral as can be, it’s difficult to ask Oklahomans to fully recognize and appreciate the scale of the danger posed by losing the coral reefs.
To that end, visual artists Emma Difani and Malcolm Zachariah have created “Seed Reef,” a new installation experience opening February 10 at Factory Obscura’s Mix-Tape. The project aims to showcase the beauty and wonder of the reefs, as well as to put guests in a position to participate and to more personally internalize this ecological call to action.
“We kind of wanted to create this immersive underwater coral reef, engaging with the ideas of climate change and coral bleaching,” Difani told me. “So it goes from the vibrant, thriving area of the reef, and then it kind of transitions into the back half, which is all bleached corals and kind of showing those consequences.”
Sculpted Paper
They achieved this simulated underwater world primarily through what they call “sculpted paper,” a creative amalgamation of printmaking, design, and kirigami (a style of origami-like paper folding.) The result is a fully 3D marine world, ocean life frozen in time and suspended seamlessly across the space utilizing lighting, shadow, and fluorescent coloring and illumination. Hundreds of small pieces all come together in the hope of capturing both the audience’s imagination and concern.
All of this culminates in an opportunity for guests to design and create their own paper “reef” pieces and add them to the installation’s depiction of the bleached and dying coral areas to simulate the real-life process of “reef seeding.”
“This paper we’re using is kind of a representation for how natural things happen,” Zachariah explained. “So there’s kind of a participatory aspect that we’re trying to get people to kind of go through the motions of how they would if they did visit a natural reef.”
Everything Connected
Emma and Malcolm say they chose to approach this topic partially from Malcolm’s own younger experiences keeping and caring for marine aquariums, but mostly as a way to use their collaborative art to represent something tangible and important in nature, a theme that they’ve explored together in past projects as well.
“Working with Emma, we’ve done this also with the monarch butterfly and our milkweed project,” Zachariah said, “where we’re thinking of how we can use that material to represent something that people may be kind of aware of, but don’t think that there are ways that you can do it in Oklahoma. But you can at least think about it and about ways you can help restore environments. It’s not just one way.”
“Part of the hope is that you realize that it is actually completely connected,” Difani adds. “These are not independent, isolated environments or issues, and part of the idea is that you should care about this, even if it is 4000 miles away from you. Part of our idea with kind of the secondary activity and education area is this idea of empowering people to say ‘okay, yes, my choices do matter,’ you know, who I vote for, what I purchase, etc. Even those little actions are important.”
Interactivity and Evolution
One of the main elements of any installation or exhibit at Mix-Tape is always interactivity and the promise of the pieces growing, evolving, and changing over time. Factory Obscura co-founder Laura Phillips is hopeful that guests will come out to participate by creating and adding their own “reefs” to the project, and that they’ll return later to see how the exhibit’s section of bleached and dying coral has potentially blossomed into a thriving, colorful new community art project.
“I think it’s going to look very different in April than it’s going to look on Wednesday when it opens,” Phillips said.
“Seed Reef” is set to show at Mix-Tape from February 10 through April 24 (with a special members-only preview night on February 9) in the gallery’s East Bay, alongside the sprawling permanent interactive exhibit that is Mix-Tape. The new installation will also be open during Factory Obscura’s annual “V-Day Bash” on February 12th, where they’ll be celebrating with DJ Reni and offering discounted membership options.
Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
