Award-winning sculptor Jason deCaires Taylor has created a series of 8 sculptures based predominantly around Australians who work in the field of marine science and marine conservation. Named Ocean Sentinels, the underwater artworks are located on the MOUA site within John Brewer Reef, Queensland, Australia, and hybridize human figures with natural marine forms, representing the figure’s particular field of study and expertise.
Meet the Ocean Sentinels
The Ocean Sentinels are made up of “the godfather of coral,” Charlie Veron, who has described 20% of all the corals on the planet, Professor Peter Harrison, the first person to record a mass coral spawning event in 1981, Jayme Marshall, one of the next generation of Indigenous leaders, Dr. David Vaughan, aquaculturist and pioneer of Plant a Million Corals, Giant Clam Man Dr.Richard Braley, Coral Ecologist Dr. Katharina Fabricius, marine zoologist, the late Sir Maurice Yonge, and a nine-year-old Molly Steer, whose Straw No More movement to get people to stop using plastic straws has been adopted by 3000 schools and counting.
The sculptures are made from a new high-grade, low carbon Earth Friendly Concrete and reinforced with marine stainless steel. The surfaces and forms of the artworks are designed to be colonized by marine life, in the hope that they will become populated with corals, sponges, and hydroids in years to come. They have been placed in shallow depths on John Brewer Reef to enable easy viewing access by snorkelers.
Jason deCaires Taylor
British artist deCaires Taylor has been creating underwater sculptures and museums for the past 16 years, submerging 1100 sculptures so far worldwide. He is probably best known for his 2006 work Vicissitudes, which features a ring of children holding hands in the Molinere Underwater Sculpture Park, Grenada, now encrusted in marine life. To see more of this artist’s amazing underwater sculptures, check out his Instagram page.
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