Holdfast, Echoes Below

HOLDFAST

2026

Holdfast, Echoes Below brings a largely unseen ecological transformation above the waterline. The title refers to the holdfast, the rootlike structure that anchors kelp to rock and to the traces of life that remain when an underwater forest disappears. As an AAUS-certified scientific diver, I have documented purple urchin barrens along the Northern California coast: rocky seafloors once occupied by dense kelp forests. Ocean warming, the severe decline of sunflower sea stars, and broader disruptions to the marine food web have allowed native purple sea urchins to multiply and consume emerging kelp. The urchins are not villains; rather, their abundance reveals an ecosystem that has lost its balance. The installation translates this submerged landscape into an immersive sculptural environment. Fabricated ocean rocks support more than 700 stoneware urchins in varied shades of purple, while a school of eleven translucent glass fish moves through the barren habitat like echoes of the shelter that once surrounded them. Behind this altered landscape, a large photograph of a healthy kelp forest captured by the artist while scuba diving offers a view of the habitat that has been diminished or lost. The contrast between the living forest in the photograph and the exposed sculptural foreground makes the ecological change visible.

More than 850 students from Del Mar, Fremont, Homestead, and Lynbrook High Schools contributed to the installation through artist-led workshops connecting marine ecology, scientific diving, and ceramic art. Students formed the spines that populate the sculpted urchins. Their individual marks accumulate into a collective field, demonstrating how many small actions can contribute to both ecological pressure and shared response. Like a forest fire beneath the waves, kelp loss can spread beyond public view. Holdfast, Echoes Below asks how art can help communities witness environmental change and participate in restoration. Rather than offering a single solution, the installation creates a meeting place for scientific inquiry, material storytelling, and collective imagination, an invitation to move from awareness toward care, action, and possibility.

The installation’s central contrast is between abundance and absence: the seafloor is crowded with hundreds of urchins, yet the larger habitat feels empty because the kelp forest is missing. The title refers to a holdfast, the rootlike base that secures kelp to underwater rock. “Echoes Below” suggests the remembered presence of a forest that once provided refuge for marine life. The strongest detail to workshop next is the relationship between the photograph and the glass fish, because that visual pairing appears to be the emotional center of the exhibition.

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