March 22: Upon further inspection

By Gideon Gerlt

I came on board R/V Falkor and immediately set to work fabricating and assembling the many parts and pieces that will come to abstractly resemble a radiolarian. It is a rather time intensive process of cutting, folding, and rolling small cylinders out of strips of metal, over and over. It is a labor of love, and it gives me time to think. During this time, I have been absorbing the research that is currently being conducted. (Read more) 

Parallax. Cornell University. 2019 (Work by Gideon Gerlt)

March 25: Tangible data conversions

By Meredith Brindley

I have seen incredible things while at sea. Alongside the R/V Falkor, I have watched flying fish leap and glide. This week on the ship we mapped two seamounts in international waters off the Baja Peninsula. I was struck by how alive the data felt. Obviously, there are real unmapped seamounts below the surface of the ocean, but because I cannot readily see the seamounts, they just feel theoretical. As they are mapped over, they solidify for me. The multibeam mapping is amazing because it takes something ephemeral (like shooting beams of sound over hidden mountains) and makes them into tangible 3D forms. (Read more) 

Meredith Brindley Great Barrier Reef Sound

March 27: Drawing connections

By Kishan Munroe

Like a pendulum swinging from side to side, Falkor cut through raging waters of the Pacific. Frigid waves slapped against the transparent portals of the mess hall, temporarily giving views split between the open sky and submerged vignettes of frothy indigo. The vessel steadily pushed forward, its hull consistently plunging into the imposing swells of a never-ending sea, only inches away. The oceanscape was not as calm as days before; however, operations aboard did not cease. This was a truly immersive experience… and I took it all in. Such moments of observation are key elements in the developmental process of my work. (Read more)

Artist-at-Sea Kishan Munroe at work on a easel set up in R/V Falkor’s Wet Lab.