Raphaëlle Peria
THE WORDS FROM ANNESOPHIE BÉRARD, OUR CURATOR :
CORAL BLEACHING
Coral bleaching is a sign of coral dieback. This phenomenon is explained by thermal stress linked to the warming of the ocean temperature, leading to the expulsion of the symbiotic algae that give corals their bright colours. In Australia, 98% of the Great Barrier Reef is affected*. The consequences are dramatic for the biodiversity that lives there: nearly two million species, or a quarter of the fish in our oceans!
French artist Raphaëlle Peria was supposed to go to Tahiti to work on this subject, but the confinement disrupted her plans. In the end, aquariums, typical of human design, are the backdrop for these explorations. By transforming the photographs through manipulation, scratching and painting, she evokes the fragile beauty of these threatened ecosystems. The whiteness rhymes with erasure and disappearance, while the fantasized colours question the reason for their presence.
*Article published in the scientific journal Current Biology, 2021
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