studio visit with marine ecologist : Alannah Vellacott

In this conversation, the artist Randi Renate speaks with Alannah Vellacott, a marine ecologist, science communicator and ocean advocate. As a Bahamian living in a small community that bordered an expansive mangrove creek system, Alannah grew up with the ocean as the backdrop to her childhood.  This episode's studio visit will explore Alannah's narrative on how she came to be a prominent advocate for coral reefs and ocean health, and her current work as a Coral Restoration Specialist at Coral Vita, an operative coral farm in Grand Bahama.  

These conversations are part of Randi Renate’s 2022 fellowship at Socrates Sculpture Park in New York City, curated by Jess Wilcox. Inspired by the anatomy and symbiotic existence of coral polyps, Renate’s sustainably sourced, cedar-clad hollow is a space for collective gathering and learning. Coral are potent symbols in narratives about climate change. Rising temperatures and ocean acidification have produced massive die-offs of this fragile ecosystem, which is also the most biodiverse on the planet. The coral’s cooperative mode of thriving–a colony of many individual polyps together acting as a united creature–is a potential model for slowing global warming and repairing the damage we have already done to our planet.