Living Data
Visualisations/Animations
Visualisations INDEX Artworks INDEX Animations INDEX
Descent into ocean
Knowledge of the ocean is revealed through art and science.
Descent into the Ocean 2013
Video: Lisa Roberts
Exectutive production: Ken Wilson
'Descent into the Ocean is followed by a return to light' refers to Joseph Conrad's book Heart of Darkness, written in response to primal forces in the Ocean. The title came only after completing the work, which seemed to come from nowhere, spontaneously.
'Philosophers spend a good deal of time inspecting and analysing processes that are usually - and perhaps must remain - implicit, unconscious, intuitive; in other words, examining the life of the right hemisphere [of the brain] from the standpoint of the left. It is perhaps not surprising that the glue begins to disintegrate, and there is a nasty cracking noise as the otherwise normally robust sense of self comes apart, possibly revealing more about the merits (or otherwise) of the process, than the self under scrutiny.'
Iain McGilchrist (2009. p.89)
On page 15 of his Introduction to the 1984 Penguin English Library edition of Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1902), Paul O'Prey refers to Albert J. Guerard's view of the story as a "a psychological-anthropological 'night journey'", meaning,
the archetypal myth ...the story of an essentially solitary journey involving profound spiritual change in the voyager. In its classical form the journey is a descent into the earth, followed by a return to light.
Conrad's explanation of his creative process (on page 16 of the 1984 Penguin English Library edition of his book) may be applied to all the arts.
To snatch... a passing phase of life is only the beginning of the task. The task approached in tenderness and faith is to hold up unquestioningly, without choice and without fear, the rescued fragment before all eyes in the light of sincere mood. It is to show its vibration, its colour, its form; and through its movement, its form, and its colour, reveal the substance of its truth - disclose its inspiring secret.
Secrets of the Ocean revealed through art and science expand understanding of photosynthesising plants upon which Life depends.
It was photosynthesis, first by some Bacteria, then by Algal cells with green pigment (Protists) in the sea, and much later by Plants on land, that created an oxygenated atmosphere... Earth is the GREEN PLANET where the energy for nearly all Life depends on Photosynthesis.
Big Picture Story, Mary E. White, 2012
