"If you ever see a girl with eyes the color of a swordfish you'll leave whoever you're with for her immediately."
James Prosek's upcoming Ocean Fishes also showed up in the current Garden & Gun (this one is not online though) but not as a review. The article was about one of the locations he visited while making the book which is not a standard collection of his paintings but rather a record of his work to be right at the place when his subjects are brought out of the water. He wanted to catch them in their most brilliant - as the fishermen see them - prior to the dulling that comes with death. This makes for some gorgeous art, I'm sure (Prosek is nothing if not talented) but some of the fish are actually only brought up via bycatch and not legally fished anymore due to diminishing numbers*. Prosek has a point that the fish were going to die with or without his participation (he's there in those cases because they are commonly bycatch in certain locations) but still, I wonder how he felt seeing something that is likely to disappear in his lifetime without colossal efforts on the part of the world to save them. That's an article (or book) I'd like to read.
A trailer was made for Ocean Fishes, as part of a larger film project "Picture the Leviathan", that includes a nice interview with Prosek about why he wanted to be onsite to see the fish before painting them. It's a great video and the whole project sounds significant but in almost in a "whistling in the dark" kind of way. Prosek makes a point of saying why he feels these animals are important and need to be saved but still I wonder - we do so much to document the world as it disappears; why can't we (all) try harder to save it in the first place?
*I want to stress I am not bashing Prosek at all for this - the bycatch happens with any deep sea fishing with nets and he is not on crazy huge factory ships that are the major reason why so much of our fishes are being decimated. I'm just sad about it happening at all.
[Post title from "Picture the Leviathan" book trailer for Ocean Fishes. This title is on the Ballou Library High School wish list.]
