Halmos Faculty Consults For ‘Choral’, a Coral Art Installation in Chicago

On August 5, 2019, localStyle’s video art installation Choral began its two-month exhibition run at 150 North Riverside Plaza in Chicago, Illinois. The artists who designed the public art installation consulted with coral experts from Northwestern University, Shedd Aquarium, and Halmos faculty member Ph.D., Timothy Swain to learn about corals, current coral research, and the threats that coral reefs face worldwide.

The title ‘Choral’ is a homophonic pun because the artists see corals as the ‘voice of the Anthropocene’, the current geological age where human activity has been the dominant influence on climate and global ecology. In the Anthropocene, corals face a diversity of threats including the potential collapse of coral reef ecosystems globally due to oceanic heating caused by anthropogenic climate change. An interview that explains the background and motivations for the project and a short video can be found at https://150mediastream.com