The underwater castle
Latest theme. About the set: « The nine mermaids » and the « Underwater castle »; The nine mermaids are related to "Underwater castle" theme, about water world. As far as possible the nine mermaids were designed to be all different, typifying a different area from seas & oceans. Basically, each of her is linked to an inhabitant of the water world. The first step was to choose nine fishes or creatures from the underwater world, thanks to a bibliographical work (1),(2),(3).Then the second step was to design a mermaid for each of them. For instance the Butterfly mermaid is linked to the young lion fish from the Japan sea, the ribbon mermaid is linked to the moray eel from the south of the Indian ocean. Each of the nine species where carefully chosen to be representative of various location. Sometime it is a common animal like some moray eel or at the opposite, rare species like some nudibranchs. The drawings of these nine fishes can be find on the gallery « drawings ». You could also see a little picture of the fish which is linked to the mermaid on top of the mermaid’s picture. Each mermaid is like an ambassador of her native place. They are invited to an important meeting at the underwater castle to discuss the state of their environment and the way to protect the water world. Regarding the drawing « The Underwater Castle », its example is a little castle located on the center of France called « Le château de Val » (4) at Bort-Les-Orgues. It was carefully selected after a research (5) regarding flooded places: valleys, little villages, hamlets where dams were built up to form lakes in France. This Castle was rescued in-extremis when the dam of Bort-les-Orgues was built, now the lonely building is on a peninsula over a calm artificial lake on the Auvergne region. Water at its feet has flooded the village on the valley. Thus the « Underwater castle » is also linked to the water world even though its model is not really flooded. (1) Institut Paul Emile Victor (IPEV) French Polar Institute. (www.institut-polaire.fr) (2) David Hall’s Encounters in the Sea Photography. (www.seaphotos.com) (3) Gyotaku, l'âme des poissons ; un livre collectif sous la direction de Daniel Pardo – Ed. Coop Breizh (4) (www.château-de-val.com) (5) La France des Grands Lacs, un patrimoine à préserver, Ed Gallimard – conservatoire du Littoral
