Ocean Acoustics: Zooplankton- Our Planets Largest Mass Migration

At dawn and dusk every day, our planets' largest migration occurs in the top 200 meters of the ocean. Zooplankton, who have hidden from predators in the gloomy, lower layers of the water column, migrate to the surface of the ocean at dusk to feed under cover of darkness. At dawn, they scoot back down to the gloomy safety deeper in the water column. Active Acoustics uses sound to "see" into the water column to track these diverse and beautiful creatures.  

Active acoustics uses sound to "see" underwater.  A transducer mounted on the research vessel sends a ping of sound into the water column and when that sound wave bumps into some sort of obstacle (in this case millions of tiny zooplankton), a returning sound wave contains information about these life forms.

I've embroidered the grand migration with embroidery stitches, beading and hundreds of (intentionally) sloppy french knots. I LOVED embroidering this daily procession of survival. 

My process involves shifting between learning science and developing sketches. When I have enough sketches, I experiment with how best to express the science I've learned. 

The process of learning the science and integrating the design of the art takes time and care. It's important for me to represent science accurately and help viewers appreciate the value of scientific research.

Early design plan for Active and Passive Acoustics.

This is a well written and beautifully illustrated article about zooplankton in the New York Times Science section.

Ocean Acoustics Project : The Art and Science of Beginnings

In June I had a terrific opportunity to be a part of a science voyage: I was invited to join scientists   aboard the Research Vessel Endeavor.  Working at the edge of the Outer Continental Shelf in the Atlantic Ocean, we were at sea for three weeks working round the clock to collect data that helps researchers understand what is happening in the ocean ecosystem.  One of the best ways to study the ocean ecosystem is by using ocean acoustics. (More on this in later posts!)

My job as an artist was to learn the basics of this fascinating branch of science and create art that helps others understand and appreciate the ocean ecosystem.  I'm dusting off this blog in order to share my art/science process with you. This is the first installment sharing my process of this (as of yet) unnamed project expressing ocean acoustics.

A year before the project started, I began  preliminary research on ocean acoustics and filled up one large sketchbook. This early sketchbook is a necessary, awkward phase in the project and out of all these mostly discarded ideas, I begin to refine my ideas. I often look over these first sketchbooks for my project at a later date and mine them for ideas in future projects.

Once on board the ship, I had access to scientists, scientific papers, and the ships crew and dug into the concepts of active and passive acoustics as well as the tools necessary for collecting data. No matter how long I've been collaborating with scientists, this is an uncomfortable phase. Every branch of science has its own specialized vocabulary, acronyms and concepts. At the same time I was  learning the science, I was adjusting to life at sea, meeting a boat load of new people and training to use equipment we were deploying to collect data. It was a challenging few weeks! 

Test sample

Dupoini silk colors

At the beginning of every project, I'm plunging into the great unknown. I'm struggling to learn the science, gathering lots of images for inspiration and creating both paper and textile sketches. The beginning phase is all about both staying  open to new learning and ideas and beginning to refine some general directions like color and textile selection. Out of this rich experience, I began to distill my ideas for the project and select the colors and fabrics I wanted to use to express the science. 

                                     

Once I lock on to general direction for the project, I use a large sheet of graph paper to plot out my ideas for the art work. Here I'm planning out two pieces: one for active acoustics and one for passive acoustics.

In future posts, I'll detail what I was learning and my artistic inspiration for the project.