The second coming

With references to “Noahs Arch”, the actual building of boats was important in this work, that on one level is about the irony of preparing for something, then the opposite happens, but the initial threat is still active.

In Thailand right before the tsunami came crushing in against the beaches, the survivors could tell about the water disappearing. They would walk out onto the dry seafloor and watch the fish gasping for air while suffocating, as they recalled the people where stunned by this sublime visual spectacle. There is something special about watching a fish suffocate, because they really try to adapt to their new environments, unlike humans drowning in water that desperately will try not to “breathe water”, the fish really tries to breathe air.

The reason for the water disappearing is the same reason that the sea draws out a little bit before a normal wave, the higher water near the beach is drawn into the incoming wave as it "rolls" into the sand as it nears the shore. A tsunami wave is just so much bigger that it removes more water from the shore; minutes after the water disappeared the water came back with devastating force.

The title “Second coming” is also a reference to the return of Jesus from Heaven to earth initiating the Last Judgment of the dead and the living and “End of the world” theories from global warming. The photo is a reference to the human effect on Earth.

The fish in the installation was inserted by a mechanical device and connected to a motion sensor, triggered by the audiences’ movements. The fish would make small subtle movements like death cramps.