During the Eocene, a tiny floating fern called azolla overtook what is now the Arctic Ocean in a massive green blanketing bloom. The area of coverage was so extensive that the azolla bloom captured a significant amount of carbon dioxide and took it to the floor of the sea when winter came and the plants died. Each summer, azolla captured 6.6 tons (6 tonnes) of carbon per acre, and during a span of 800,000 summers, azolla drew down and sequestered enough carbon dioxide to push the earth into our current icehouse state, setting off an ice age.

Somewhere in the pet store supply chain, two crayfish from different parts of the planet met in an aquarium and they produced a very special daughter who later produced her own daughter (an exact copy of herself) without a partner. That daughter continues to reproduce parthenogenetically across the planet, many instances of herself producing many instances of herself; one of her is swimming here.

Instead of waiting for iPhone 4 sales to plateau, Apple released the iPhone 4S while people were still gobbling up it’s obsolete predecessor. Hyped as “the most amazing phone yet,” Apple broke it’s own record by selling twice as many 4S phones in the first three days than they had sold of the iPhone 4 in its first three days, all thanks to Siri, the beloved voice-activated virtual assistant and the first-generation referent of the S designation in the product specification.

DATE: 2018

MATERIALS: water, Azolla filiculoides, Procambarus virginalis, iPhone 4S, acrylic tank

SCALE: object

DIMENSIONS: 28 x 23 x 23cm

SITE: n/a

STATUS: complete

A Shadow As A Stain, (2018, group exhibition) ACRE Projects, Chicago.

Gallery Guide

Animal handling provided by Aquamoon