Suzanne's Mom's Blog

Photo: Institute For Figuring.
Coral Forest – Helsinki, crocheted from recycled plastic. A collaboration between Christine and Margaret Wertheim and the Helsinki Satellite Reefers, hosted by Helsink Art Museum and Helsinki Biennial 2021.

Remember my post on how crochet art was drawing attention to dying coral reefs? (See it here.) Well, after my friend Kristina told me about seeing some of the new additions to the crochet project, I decided to post a follow-up.

Siobhan Roberts reported at the New York Times in January, “Every year after the full moons in late October and November, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef begins its annual spawning — first the coral species inshore, where waters are warmer, then the offshore corals, the main event. Last year, this natural spectacle coincided with the woolly propagation of two new colonies of the Crochet Coral Reef, a long-running craft-science collaborative artwork now inhabiting the Schlossmuseum in Linz, Austria, and the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh.

“To date, nearly 25,000 crocheters (‘reefers’) have created a worldwide archipelago of more than 50 reefs — both a paean to and a plea for these ecosystems, rainforests of the sea, which are threatened by climate change. The project also explores mathematical themes, since many living reef organisms biologically approximate the quirky curvature of hyperbolic geometry. …

“The surface of a sphere displays constant positive curvature; at all points, the surface bends inward toward itself. And a hyperbolic plane exhibits constant negative curvature; at all points, the surface curves away from itself. Reef life thrives on hyperbolism, so to speak; the curvy surface structure of coral maximizes nutrient intake, and nudibranchs propel through water with frilly flanges.

“In the artworks, marine morphologies are modeled — crocheted — with loopy verisimilitude. A bit like Monet’s water lilies, the crochet corals are abstract representations of nature, said Christine Wertheim, an artist and writer now retired from the California Institute of the Arts. Dr. Wertheim is the driving artistic force behind the project, which she created with Margaret Wertheim, her twin sister, a science writer who is in charge of scientific and mathematical components as well as management. …

“Crochet Coral Reef exhibitions typically have two main components: The Wertheims provide an anchor, of sorts, with works from their collection that they have crocheted over the years. They also incorporate pieces by select skilled international contributors. One is a ‘bleached reef,’ evoking corals stressed by increases in ocean temperature; another, a ‘coral forest’ made from yarn and plastic, laments the debris that pollutes reef systems.

“Then in response to an open call, volunteers far and wide crochet a pageant of individual specimens that agglomerate in a ‘satellite reef,’ staged by a local curatorial team with guidance from the Wertheims. … All contributors are credited.

“The largest satellite reef thus far coalesced in 2022 at the Museum Frieder Burda in Baden-Baden, Germany, with some 40,000 coral pieces by about 4,000 contributors. The Wertheims call this the Sistine Chapel of crochet reefs (documented in a splashy exhibition catalog). But the show at the Linz Schlossmuseum, which is dedicated to natural science as well as art and culture, is reminiscent of the work of the painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo, whose collage portraits from depictions of fruits, vegetables and flowers are ‘fantastically heterogeneous, also very funny and clever,’ Ms. Wertheim said.

“The Linz satellite reef unites some 30,000 pieces by 2,000 crocheters. The disparate parts take colorful inspiration from traditional Austrian ‘craftswomanship,’ as the exhibit text puts it, and there is a vast, glittery coral wall that gives a nod to the artist Gustav Klimt. In the Wertheims’ view, however, the crochet coral project is proof that it is not always lone geniuses who create great art, but also communities. In the art world, that is a radical idea, they noted, yet in science big collaborative projects and papers with thousands of authors are not unprecedented. …

“The mathematical dimension of the story intersects (from afar) with research by the applied mathematician Shankar Venkataramani and his students at the University of Arizona. They use idealized models to study hyperbolic surfaces in nature. [The] benefit, he said, is that it helps optimize processes like circulation and nutrient absorption. …

“When Margaret Wertheim, who studied math, physics and computer science at university, learned hyperbolic geometry, she found it ‘a bit bamboozling.’ She took the principles more on faith than understanding. Yet through crocheting models, she said, ‘you really do learn in a very deep way what a hyperbolic structure is, and in a way that I think is very powerfully pedagogical.’ “

More at the Times, here. Gorgeous photos.

See also Crochet Coral Reef, here. As the website notes, “Every crafter who contributes to the project is free to create new species of crochet reef organisms by changing the pattern of stitches or working with novel materials. Over time, a Darwinian landscape of wooly possibility has been brought into being. What started from simple seeds is now an ever-evolving, artifactual, hand-made ‘tree of life.’ “