Weedy Sea Dragon by David Doubilet
In the issue of April 5, 2014, the David Doubilet series in the Schleswig-Holstein Journal, the magazine of the Schleswig-Holstein newspaper publisher, continues with my article about Doubilet's fairytale-like photo of a sea dragon:
No, this image is not from a science fiction film. It depicts a completely real underwater creature, but one that is completely unknown in our northern latitudes: a sea dragon that only occurs in the kelp forests and seagrass meadows off the South Australian coast and the island of Tasmania. "Diving there is a fantastic experience," enthuses David Doubilet, "an underwater world like in a fairy tale. Everything seems so enchanted and unique. Sea dragons that look like colorful fantasy toy figures from the 1950s scurry through these surreal-looking dense forests of kelp and seagrass in search of shrimp."
To capture this impressive scene in Waterfall Bay off Tasmania, Doubilet observed a male animal that kept appearing in front of him. He positioned a flashlight in the front left and another in the back right to perfectly illuminate the sea dragon's body in all its expressive color at the right moment as it swam past, but left the background of the kelp forest in mysterious darkness, only slightly brightened by the weak daylight.
The result is an image that, for me, is one of the most beautiful and touching motifs in Doubilet's work - pure cinema, to put it in the language of film.
The David Doubilet retrospective currently being shown in Iserlohn starts on May 16th in the Schleswig City Museum - combined with a special event that is unique in Germany: “David Doubilet live in Schleswig” also on May 16th at 20 p.m. (banquet hall of the Danish high school AP Møller- Skolen). Advance sales at all known presale locations in Schleswig or by email: stadtmuseum@schleswig.de
