Art as Reef

The Art As Reef Project, headed up by marine biologist, SCUBA instructor, and artist Christopher Wojcik, in partnership with the Blue Ocean Institute, is currently fabricating a series of sculptural pieces to be deployed onto the ocean floor.   The first of which is a forty-foot long, anatomically correct, representation of a horseshoe crab. The sculpture will literally “live” on the bottom of the sea for hundreds or even thousands of years and act as an artificial reef.  It will attract fish, crustaceans, and encrusting organisms of all sorts.  The sculpture will be sunk off of the coast of New Jersey, adding to the fifteen already established reef systems.  The merits of artificial reefs have long been recognized.  They provide vertical structure in areas that are generally bare, which reduces the fishing pressure in popular areas and offer refuge for juvenile fishes and invertebrates.  The surface of the structure also provides an attachment surface for filter feeders like blue mussels, which help clean the water of algae blooms caused by fertilizer run-off from rivers and storm drains.

As an art project, the horseshoe crab sculpture will help to shine a light on some critical ocean issues and serve as an educational vehicle used to promote the stewardship of our near-shore environment.  A public education campaign comprised of press releases, speaking engagements, public appearances, and an interpretive graphics presentation will be occurring during construction, and prior to the sinking, of the sculpture.  A digital media presentation will be created featuring every aspect of the project so that the messages conveyed continue to resonate long after the sculpture begins its life on the seafloor.  It is the creator’s intent that the uniqueness of the project will attract world-wide attention, and will allow great numbers of people to appreciate the aesthetics of the sculptures form and to hear the message.

The horseshoe crab was chosen because it is a perfect shape for a reef, containing a large area of protected habitat beneath and a shape that is designed by nature to withstand ocean currents and waves.  The piece represents my belief that the oceans are a fragile place and that if a “living fossil” like the horseshoe crab, having thus survived longer than practically anything else on earth, is in trouble then it does not bode well for the sea as a whole. View from the air.