Photo by Matthew Cromwell

Young artists from Popopstudios (specifically Giovana Swaby and Kachelle Knowles), in collaboration with local artist Antonius Roberts and Conchservation, and with help from Believe, The Baha Mar Foundation and The Bahamas National Trust are installing conch art at the Tree of Trees – an installation by Antonius Roberts.

The Tree of Trees will be used as a focal point to spark discussion about the conservation of conch and other natural resources in The Bahamas.

The project is being done to raise awareness about overfishing and the the decline of the conch population by fishing immature conch.

Kachelle Knowles said:

“Giovanna and I collected conch shells from all over Nassau and measured the lip of the shells to determine it’s thickness. This is a tell tale sign to discover how mature the conch is and anything measuring under 15mm is not considered sexually mature.

We stenciled each measurement on the shells themselves and hung them based on their numbers. The piece is a part of the Tree of Trees done by Antonius Roberts located on Baha Mar Blvd.

The piece gives an eerie visual to the conch population and projects a grim future of the conch species if the community is not aware of the dangers of overfishing.

The project itself was nothing like what we expected.

Collecting the shells and cleaning them was a side to the conch industry I have never seen. It is not pretty… {Laugh}

It’s almost alarming how many shells are just thrown away and there isn’t a prime outlet for them to be used.

Also, about half of the shells we collected were not larger than 15mm. With our firsthand experience, we hope to convey the concerns Conchservation has for the conch species in our piece and further share what we have learned since beginning the project.”

Photos: Matthew Cromwell