Art & Culture
Janavi Kramer: Ocean Artist & Scientific Illustrator, on The Importance of Art in Supporting Ocean Conservation
Janavi Kramer is an internationally-selling Ocean Artist and Scientific Illustrator based in Hertfordshire with a lifelong fascination with the Ocean. Using vibrant and visceral colours, her work emulates a unique quality that showcases the wonders of the Ocean. Her work opens up a window into the world below to inspire connection and empathy for those who look through it. Janavi’s mission is not only to evoke passion in others but to also highlight the threats impacting the marine environment and the species within it.
How did you become interested in both art and scientific illustration, and what inspired you to combine these two fields in your work?
Art and the Ocean have always been elements present in my life. These separate worlds each played a significant role in forming my path, but a few years ago there was a pivotal moment where the two collided.
After my first Ocean dive in 2014, in a matter of moments, the experience turned my world upside down. I was in complete awe of the beauty surrounding me, enveloped in this new alien environment. It was almost like a sensory overload – and from then on I was hooked.
However, even early on in my diving experience, I started to notice a lot of things that I found alarming. Sadly on many occasions, I saw firsthand the impact we humans are having on the Ocean. These moments that began to stack up were a bit of a slow burner. I took time to process it and figure out how and what I could do about it. Looking back now, these experiences, though heart-wrenching, were my catalyst for change. The more I saw, the more I felt something shift inside me and I knew I had to find a way to help protect it. I began a transition into discovering how to use my skills as an Artist to contribute towards the world of conservation. Over the years my work has been fluid and it took a while for me to find my style. Now my work takes form as vibrant and eye-catching species depictions, illustrations or graphics to support science communications and even thought-provoking pieces that spread awareness about the continual destruction of the Ocean and the creatures within it.
Can you describe your creative process when working on a new piece?
For me, every piece is different. But the beginning of every piece always starts with finding connection. Connecting to my work is such a crucial element because I believe that is the only way that the people who see my work will also feel emotionally engaged. Because the work I create can vary greatly depending on the project, this can mean creating life-like qualities to bring a species to life off the page or incorporating thought provoking illustrations that give the viewer an opportunity to stop and think.
The mission behind my work is to showcase the weird and wonderful creatures that exist in our Oceans, to not only educate and encourage others to care for them but to inspire change and action.
What role do you believe art plays in supporting ocean conservation?
For hundreds of years art and science have worked harmoniously alongside one another in a partnership that has given us a greater understanding of the natural world, making knowledge accessible to all. Art is a universal language. It breaks down the barriers of conventional language, education – and even opportunity.
In this modern day, surrounded by rapidly evolving technology, ever-growing cities and booming populations, it’s easy to forget that we are a part of nature. As a species we have come so far with our advancements that this simple fact has been lost somewhere along the way. And as a result, a huge amount of the world’s population is disconnected from nature and the impact we are having on it. Everything on this planet exists almost in a giant symbiosis and every action can send ripples throughout the environment.
With art I hope to help reconnect people back to nature and inspire change and the desire to protect our oceans. By spreading awareness and making science accessible in this way, we can replant the seed of understanding that we are all part of this ecosystem and the destruction of the Ocean is not only an unimaginable tragedy but also has a huge impact on our existence. Part of the responsibility we hold as individuals in the conservation community is to ensure that the educational information, resources and knowledge is accessible to anyone and everyone. If you give people the power of knowledge then we can create change, anything from consumption behaviours, reducing plastic use or even becoming an ocean advocate. At the very least, I hope the work I create can start a conversation and encourage people to engage in the one thing we can’t live without – the Ocean.
Can you discuss a particular project or piece that you found particularly challenging or rewarding, and what you learned from the experience?
A recent project that I found very rewarding was in collaboration with The Shark Trust. I was approached to be a part of Oceanic 31 which brings together wildlife artists from across the world who are passionate about conservation and using art as a tool for positive change to highlight the importance of shark conservation.
This particular piece was very special as the opportunity came just after I had my first experience encountering Scalloped Hammerhead Sharks, a critically endangered species, in the Red Sea. As the stars aligned, it meant that I was able to paint from my own experiences so it will always hold a special place in my heart!
The final result was ‘Deep Connection’, a watercolour painting that illustrates a shiver of Scalloped Hammerhead Sharks swimming overhead. It embodies the sense of connection and understanding your experience when in the presence of these majestic creatures. As apex predators, sharks play a critical role in maintaining the equilibrium in the marine ecosystem. Yet this iconic species, and many other shark species, are disappearing from our Oceans at an alarming rate as a result of human interference. My hope is that my work offers an alternative perspective in which we are able to witness their power and beauty and be inspired to make a positive change and protect this critically endangered species.
What has influenced your work and played a role in shaping it?
For me, there is no better place than to be in the water; so it goes without saying that the Ocean itself is my biggest inspiration! Whether I am above or below it, it fills me with awe and curiosity. I would say diving in particular opened my eyes to the wonders of the Ocean. It is such a unique privilege and experience that it has always given me this feeling that I wanted to share it with others. It is almost like a gateway into this world full of a kaleidoscope of vibrant colours, textures and patterns, and I think the excitement and inspiration I feel underwater is evident in my work.
I am also greatly inspired by the work of marine charities and organisations that are fighting tirelessly and against the odds to protect our Ocean. Part of my mission is to support their invaluable work through donations, collaborations and spreading awareness of their work. I am incredibly proud to have previously worked with the likes of Natural England, The Shark Trust, the Manta Trust and many more and hope to expand this list in the near future!
What advice would you give to aspiring scientific illustrators or artists interested in incorporating science into their work?
I would strongly urge anyone with that passion to push towards it. It’s not always an easy journey but there are many like-minded people within this community that will either support you or join forces with you. On my journey, something that I have learnt is that if you are truly passionate about something, it becomes almost infectious to others around you! We are in a time where the power of storytelling has never been more crucial. By helping to give a voice to the ocean, through art, science or advocacy, we can make a difference and perhaps one day your journey to save the ocean will be a story that will inspire others to try!
What do you hope viewers take away from your art, and what impact do you hope to have on the broader field of science communication?
What I don’t want is for my art, years long after I’m gone, to be considered as a documentation of the magical and mythical creatures that once lived amongst our oceans. I truly believe there is still the opportunity to make a change and even recover some of what has been lost.
Unfortunately there are now countless threats impacting our Oceans; almost all of which stem from human interference such as habitat degradation, plastic and noise pollution. We are living at a pivotal moment in history where if we do not act now we will witness not only the extinction of many vital marine species and unique ecosystems but also the detrimental impact it will have on our existence too.
By merging the worlds of art and science, we create accessibility and we open up the conversation to a much broader audience. It’s easy to forget within the ocean science community that what is common knowledge within this space, is not necessarily the case in the wider world. For this reason, I hope that my work inspires individuals and communities to feel empowered by knowledge and create the opportunity to respond and take action.
To see more artwork and support her works please visit:
Website: www.belowandbeyondart.co.uk
Instagram: @Belowandbeyondart
Facebook: /belowandbeyondart
Twitter: @Janavi_kramer
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Art & Culture
Announcing the Winners of the 2025 Science Without Borders® Challenge
A Tribute to the Ocean’s Keystone Species:
Announcing the Winners of the 2025 Science Without Borders® Challenge
ANNAPOLIS, MD — The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation is proud to announce the winners of the 2025 Science Without Borders® Challenge, an international student art contest that promotes ocean conservation. This year’s theme, Marine Keystone Species, invited students to create artwork highlighting species that play a critical role in maintaining the structure and health of ocean ecosystems.
Open to primary and secondary school students 11–19 years old, the competition received an overwhelming response this year. Over 1,300 young artists from 75 countries submitted artwork—each piece a unique interpretation of a marine keystone species, from sea otters and mangroves to corals and sharks. These species may not always be the most numerous or well-known, but they have an outsized impact on their environment. Their presence helps maintain biodiversity, balance food webs, and support ecosystem resilience. If a keystone species is removed, the entire ecosystem could shift dramatically or collapse. Through their art, students explored these complex ecological relationships and made a compelling case for ocean conservation.
Artwork in the competition was judged in two categories based on age. The winning entries are not only beautiful pieces of artwork—they are a tribute to the animals that keep our ocean ecosystems in balance.
In the 15–19 age group, the first-place winner of the 2025 Science Without Borders® Challenge is Hyungjun Chin, with his enchanting piece, “The Keeper.” An 18-year-old student from the Republic of Korea, Hyungjun’s artwork depicts a sea otter eating sea urchins in a vibrant kelp forest, highlighting the otter’s role in protecting the kelp from overgrazing.
“Winning the Science Without Borders Challenge® means a lot to me,” said Hyungjun. “It feels incredibly rewarding to have my artwork recognized on an international level, especially when it’s about a topic I care deeply about—the environment. I wanted my artwork to show how every species has a role and how protecting even one can save many.”
Second place in the 15–19 category went to Kimin Kim of the Republic of Korea for her artwork, “Bridge Between Waters and Worlds.” Her piece highlights the importance of mangrove trees as habitat for species both above and below the waterline, and their role in purifying the water for nearby seagrass meadows.
Daniel Yu from Hackensack, New Jersey, claimed third place with “The Sea’s Yggdrasil,” a striking portrayal of mangroves as ecosystem engineers—stabilizing coastlines, preventing erosion, and filtering pollutants from the water to support surrounding marine life.
In the 11–14 age group, Gia Kim, age 12, from Los Angeles, California, earned first place for “Melting Grounds,” her powerful painting of krill—tiny but vital creatures that form the heart of the food web in the Arctic and Antarctic. Her artwork illustrates how the loss of such species, due to threats like climate change and ocean acidification, could lead to ecological collapse.
“I hope this piece raises awareness about our damaged ocean and what could happen if we continue to harm it,” said Gia. “This is our planet, and we can make a change, starting with our warming ocean.”
Second place in the 11–14 age group went to Kate Wang from Canada for “Seagrass Savior,” which illustrates how the large appetites of tiger sharks help protect fragile seagrass ecosystems.
Third place was awarded to Annie Douglas from The Bahamas for “The Beauty of Coral Reef,” celebrating reef-building corals. Although coral reefs cover less than 1% of the ocean floor, they support roughly 25% of all marine species, including over 4,000 kinds of fish.
Each of the winners will receive scholarships of up to $500 from the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation to celebrate their achievements and help them pursue their interests in art and ocean conservation.
Now in its 13th year, the Science Without Borders® Challenge continues to engage students in important ocean science and conservation topics through art. The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation created the competition to educate students around the world about the need to preserve our oceans and inspire the next generation of ocean advocates.
“The goal of this contest has always been to educate students about the ocean through art,” said Amy Heemsoth, Chief Operating Officer and Director of Education at the Foundation. “This year’s theme helped them understand how essential certain species are to the health of marine ecosystems. Their artwork serves as a powerful reminder of our responsibility to protect our oceans for future generations.”
The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation extends its heartfelt congratulations to all the winners and participants of the 2025 Science Without Borders® Challenge, and thanks them for using their creativity and passion to inspire positive change for our oceans.
For more information:
Visit: www.LOF.org
Gallery
About the Organizations:
About the Science Without Borders® Challenge:
The Science Without Borders® Challenge is an international student art contest run by the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation to engage students in marine conservation through art. The annual competition welcomes entries from all primary and secondary school students 11–19 years old. Scholarships of up to $500 are awarded to the winning entries. Students and teachers interested in next year’s competition can learn more and apply at:
www.livingoceansfoundation.org/SWBchallenge
About the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation:
The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation is a nonprofit environmental organization dedicated to protecting and restoring the health of the world’s oceans. Through science, outreach, and education, the Foundation works to conserve coral reefs and other tropical marine ecosystems, enhance ocean literacy, and inspire conservation action. Learn more at www.livingoceansfoundation.org
Art & Culture
Wonder Soil Mopping Up Climate Change
Let the Ground Keep the Falling Rainwater
A recent science article utilizing multiple indirect data sources and models estimates that the world’s soil moisture water loss from 1979 to 2016 is 3,941 cubic kilometers. This is an enormous amount of water. Lake Huron holds 3,500 cubic kilometers, while Lake Michigan holds 4,918 cubic kilometers.
Unless you are a soil microbe, springtail, worm, or robin foraging for worms, soil moisture likely isn’t at the top of your list of concerns, even if you are very worried about climate change. The distinction between dirt and soil is that soil is alive and can retain moisture. The difference between flour and bread is life; yeast consumes flour, creating bread.
The bread of my youth, Wonder Bread, once claimed to build bodies eight ways (protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron, Vitamin B1, Vitamin B2, Niacin, and energy). They upped that figure in 1971 to 12 ways, at which time the Federal Trade Commission made them scale back their promises.
Soil also builds bodies (fungi, microbes, mites, tardigrades, and all) with nutrients prepared for consumption by bacteria and energy supplied by plants, which photosynthesize carbon dioxide and water into carbohydrates. A plant repairs itself when cut or chewed, producing more plant fiber and carbohydrates pushed out of roots as exudate to nourish fungi and the soil.
Add water to dirt or flour, and you’ll get a sticky mess. Soil holds moisture, much like sliced bread, which will hold a liquid egg to become French Toast and still make room to soak up maple syrup. Four inches deep, healthy soil acts as a carbon sponge, holding seven inches of rainwater.
The problem with soil begins at the crust. If it becomes excessively crusty, the soil surface will not accept or retain water. We contribute to the hardening of the surface through heavy tillage, fertilizers that harm microbes, repeated fires, drainage, destruction of wetlands, deforestation, loss of biodiversity, erosion, unmanaged grazing, and all their combinations.
We’ve deprived the world’s soil and the lives within more than a Lake Huron volume of life-giving moisture, and that’s just the beginning of the troubles ahead. When the land dries, plants lose the ability to release water vapor that evaporates to cool or condense, which warms with the morning dew. With plant evapotranspiration greatly reduced, the hundreds of horsepower per acre of solar power cycling water is re-routed to warming and baking the earth. The rising hot air draws in more drying winds. Cumulus cloud formation ceases, except for fiercer afternoon thunderstorms.
Raindrops unable to penetrate the soil join to form rivulets that gather speed and converge to become streams, transporting sediments that scour the land. Erosion carves, sedimentation smothers, and floodwaters rise, bringing more destruction.
A quiet trail winds through the forest, evidence of how land can absorb, hold, and slowly release water back into the ecosystem.
The clouds have silver linings because the annual rainfall amounts have not changed significantly. When it rains and water is plentiful, we need to slow it down and return it to the soil or ground, where it will be when needed during dry weather to recharge rivers. We should give the ground natural rights to retain its rainwater. Instead of stormwater, the rainwater should be channeled into the ground through rain gardens, pumps, cisterns, and French drains whenever a developer transforms vegetation and soil into constructions of cement and steel.
The loss of green vegetation and soils from the landscape resembles the emperor with no clothes. We are so enamored with our constructions and artificial creations that we fail to see the naked truth. For example, Boston receives an average of 43.6 inches of rain every year. The rains come in stronger bursts, yet the annual volume remains consistent. The damage does not originate from the sky but from stormwater flooding communities. Tidal dams are constructed to keep out the rising seas, only to prevent stormwater from the land from reaching the sea and causing more flood damage. Therefore, during the dry summer heat, it is no surprise that the land becomes so dry that forest fires ravage once wet areas, such as the red-maple swamps in Middleton – the landscape’s got no water.
A family strolls through a winter forest, where the land remains porous, alive, and capable of holding the rain that falls upon it.
Developers profit while municipalities manage the water from off their properties at great expense to the community. Developers must be held accountable for the land’s hydrology and not be permitted to flush stormwater away to water works that most municipalities cannot afford to manage, leaving residents in low-lying areas of town standing in combined sewage overflow.
Let’s put the rainwater back into the soil to replenish life in the rhizosphere. The figure of 3,941 cubic kilometers represents a significant amount of water lost from the world’s soils. By allowing (and encouraging) rainwater to infiltrate the ground where it falls, we can reduce stormwater damage, combat climate change, and decrease sea level rise by as much as 25 percent (10 mm). More water in the soil will result in healthier soils, enable plants to photosynthesize for more days, provide additional shade in hot weather, and make our neighborhood climate more comfortable with more life throughout the year.
A group of hikers walk a compacted winter trail through the woods — a reminder that soil, even under snow, remains part of a living, water-holding system.
Dr. Rob Moir is a nationally recognized and award-winning environmentalist. He is the president and executive director of the Ocean River Institute, a nonprofit based in Cambridge, MA, that provides expertise, services, resources, and information not readily available on a localized level to support the efforts of environmental organizations. Please visit www.oceanriver.org for more information.
References
- Seo, et al. (2025, March 27). Abrupt sea level rise and Earth’s gradual pole shift reveal permanent hydrological regime changes in the 21st century. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adq6529
Aquacultures & Fisheries
Entries of URI’s ‘Ocean View’ Youth Art Competition to be Displayed at Pawtucket Gallery
This article is written by Neil Nachbar.
Submissions will be on display at the Art League RI gallery from April 5-27; winning entries will be showcased at URI’s Graduate School of Oceanography thereafter
KINGSTON, R.I. – About 300 Rhode Island students in grades kindergarten through 12th grade entered the third biennial “Ocean View” student art competition, organized by the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography (GSO).
All submissions will be displayed at the Art League RI gallery in Pawtucket, 80 Fountain Street, Suite 107A, from April 5-27. Three winners from each of the four age divisions will be announced at a ceremony at the gallery on Thursday, April 17 at 3 p.m.
Students were required to submit a statement of no more than 100 words on the theme, “What does ‘The Ocean State’ mean to you?’” Their two-dimensional artwork was limited to 24 inches by 36 inches. Suggested art mediums included illustration, painting, mixed media and collage, and photography.
The judges were three professional artists: Janine Wong, Laurie Kaplowitz, and Ruth Clegg, who is also the president of the board of directors of Art League RI.
Wong takes a multidisciplinary approach when creating abstract prints, weaving together elements of art, craft, design, and architecture. Kaplowitz uses the human figure to explore nature and existence. Her art has been exhibited in galleries in Boston, Los Angeles, New York, Dallas, Miami, and San Francisco. Clegg’s art, which includes photography, video, printmaking, painting, and collage, has been displayed at the Providence Art Club, Bristol Museum of Art, Mystic Museum of Art, the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Care New England, and the Smithsonian Graphic Art Collection.
“Art League RI is pleased to host the ‘Ocean View’ art competition with the URI Graduate School of Oceanography,” said Clegg. “We’re happy to encourage children to recognize the value of the ocean through the process of creating these works of art.”
After April 27, the 12 award-winning pieces of art will be showcased at GSO’s Ocean Science & Exploration Center. The winners will be invited to GSO for a reception on a date to be determined, where they will be presented their awards. The art will be displayed for at least a year, where they may be viewed by the public, students, staff, and faculty.
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