FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Travel

Split-Screen Coral Photos Free This Artist from Her Body

It's hard to tell where Nadia Huggins' body ends and the sea begins.
Images courtesy the artist

In passing a coral reef, it's easy to see a face, an arm, or a brain in the mass of underwater architecture. Caribbean photographer Nadia Huggins riffs on humanity's penchant for pareidolia in a breathtaking new series that joins her own body parts with the deteriorating reefs off the coast of her native islands of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Transformations, a subset of her ongoing Fighting the Currents project, pairs images of curvy corals that line up with her own curves, tricking the mind into viewing them as a single entity. She eschewed compressed air and a respirator, holding her breath and free diving in order to get the shots she envisioned.

Advertisement

Huggins takes photos in these diptychs on her daily swim, an escape from terrestrial life. "In the sea, as a woman who identifies as other, my body becomes displaced from my everyday experiences," she tells The Creators Project. "Gender, race, and class are dissolved because there are no social and political constructs to restrain and dictate my identity. These constructs have no place or value in that environment. This idea creates the foundation for these portraits."

As in her photos of the Caribbean's "lost boys," Transformation is heavily tied to the identity of the land. Huggins has witnessed the degradation of the reefs firsthand, so in a sense, they're a part of her. Making these photos serves the dual purpose of conceptualizing her underwater self and humanizing the environment that's being mistreated.

"Most people's experience with the sea occurs at eye level with the horizon and they are oblivious to what is happening below the surface. I am interested in the notion that "just because you can’t see something doesn’t mean it isn’t there," she says. Thus, the space she has left in the center of each diptych represents a choice: "It is in this moment that the viewer makes the decision if both worlds are able to separate or merge." Decide for yourself below.

See more of Nadia Huggins' work on her website.

Related:

Stunning Underwater Photos Capture Youth in the Caribbean

Take a Trip Underwater, 'For the Love of the Sea'

Blissfully Lyrical Photos Capture Swimmers Frozen in Movement