Graduation Year

2026

Document Type

Campus Only Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Environmental Analysis

Second Department

Art

Reader 1

Veronica Padilla Vriesman

Reader 2

Aly Ogasian

Reader 3

Adam Davis

Abstract

Ocean acidification poses an accelerating threat to marine calcifiers, particularly to the Mytilus genus, an ecologically important taxon that serves as a biogeochemical indicator of changes in ocean carbonate chemistry, acting as a preserver of past oceanographic conditions. Increased atmospheric carbon dioxide has lowered seawater pH, leading to slowed calcification rates, reduced shell structural integrity, and mineralogical changes in aragonite and calcite layers documented in closely related Mytilus congeners. This thesis presents an interdisciplinary investigation combining marine science with ceramics to both quantify and visually communicate these dissolution processes.

Two methodological approaches were developed in the laboratory. First, growth banding patterns in historical early 20th century versus modern Mytilus trossulus specimens from Sitka, Alaska, USA were analyzed using grayscale profile imaging to identify long-term morphological shifts in shell deposition. Second, shell hash buffering experiments were conducted using Mytilus californianus to evaluate whether the quantity and particle size of crushed shell material could stabilize pH and mitigate shell dissolution under acidified conditions. Dissolution trials exposed test valves to acidified seawater across 24-hour and 48-hour timeframes with varying hash quantities (0, 1, 2, and 4g) and size classes (SM and LG).

On the artistic side, several larger scale hand-built large unfired clay vessels were constructed and embedded with calcined M. californianus shell powder directly into the clay body. These vessels were carried into the ocean at various Southern California shores and tide pools, filming their collapse from the waves as shell powder was released back into its environment.  The vessels dissolved on contact with seawater, enacting in compressed time the structural failure that ocean acidification performs slowly and invisibly on living shells. This dissolution was documented through multi-channel video projection and installed in a gallery setting, with ceramic fragments, beach debris, and hydrophone audio creating an immersive encounter with a process normally invisible to human perception. Drawing on Nixon's concept of slow violence, Bennett's vibrant matter, and Merewether's theory of the trace, the work translates the incremental erasure of shell structures into something immediate.

Combining the work of material practice and scientific research argues that addressing ocean acidification demands both forms of knowledge simultaneously– understanding what is being lost demands not only data but physical media that make loss visible.

Download

This thesis is restricted to the Claremont Colleges current faculty, students, and staff.

Share

COinS