ARTZUID new work Seaweed Skeleton nr.8 Margot Berkman Sculpture Biennale Amsterdam
Seaweed Skeleton No. 8 2025 Margot Berkman
(The Remains of a Former Kelp Forest)
Do you need a physical object -such as a skeleton- to become aware of finitude?
With the series Seaweed Skeletons, Margot Berkman visualizes the invisible underwater: Seaweed provides more oxygen than rainforests, but the organic process is that dead seaweed dissolves in the sea. Seaweed skeletons are structures that do not exist in reality. They are structures that were once a soft, mobile and lively part of the Kelp Forest, now stand still in space, like fossils from times gone by.
Five upward-winding red arms seem to beg for help; it is an existential cry for help. ‘Seaweed Skeleton 8’ brings the transience of life in the ocean to the surface of our consciousness. The image is both an ode and a warning. The floating movement of the oxygen-rich kelp is trapped in an immobile future.
In Margot Berkman’s oeuvre, ocean pollution has played an important role since Fukushima-2011; with large works in public space she draws attention to climate change and sea level rise under the title The Ocean Breathes. In production is work for the stage of Venice 2026.