Courtney Mattison

Ceramics

Courtney Mattison, Malum Geminos (“Evil Twins” in Latin)(detail)(2019). Glazed stoneware and porcelain. Dimensions: 7’ x 21’ x 2’. Photograph by Paul Mutino for the Florence Griswold Museum. ©2019 Courtney Mattison. Courtesy of the artist.

Courtney Mattison’s hand-sculpted ceramic wall relief vividly depicts the coral bleaching caused by carbon dioxide emissions dissolving into the sea.

Mattison works in ceramic because its chemistry parallels that of natural reefs: calcium carbonate is both a glaze ingredient and the compound corals secrete to sculpt their bony structures.

The relief’s title, Malum Geminos (“evil twins” in Latin) pays homage to a statement by Jane Lubchenco, then NOAA Administrator, to the 2009 UN Climate Change Conference. Lubchenco called ocean acidification the “equally evil twin” of climate change. The skeletal design also references Dr. Lubchenko’s description of ocean acidification as “osteoporosis of the sea.”