A series of works examining the presence, disappearance, and return of an alga that once dominated the underwater landscape of the Polish Baltic coast. Although this alga is still present in other parts of the Baltic Sea, it disappeared completely from the Polish coast in the 1970s.
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Furcellaria lumbricalis
2026, intarsia (Karelian birch, steel), 18 x 23 cm
The main reasons for this disappearance were twofold: on the one hand, the post-war years were a time of catastrophic pollution and eutrophication of the Baltic Sea. Unfiltered sewage flowed from the successively established industrial plants – some directly into the sea, others into rivers, which also ended up in the same place. The development of industry and the period of recovery from the devastation of World War II marked a time of ecological collapse for the Baltic Sea.
In the 1960s, commercial algae harvesting began, primarily forkbeard (Furcellaria lumbricalis) – an alga that forms underwater clusters with fucus. Forkbeard was harvested to produce, among other things, a gelling agent for agar. However, when estimating the underwater forkbeard stocks, errors were made repeatedly, and within a few years, perhaps as much as half the population was lost. The fucus disappeared along with it.
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Bladderwrack attached to a stone
2026, intarsia (poplar burl, California walnut burl, steel), 29 x 61 cm
“The Bay of Singing Grasses” is a romantic novel written in 1967 by Polish novelist Stanisława Fleszarowa-Muskat, which highlights the importance of algae for the region. “Dorota, a young scientist, and her team are working on an experimental method for producing agar. While working in the Bay of Puck, she meets Kashubian fishermen and algae hunters. Dominik, a handsome trawler captain, attracts her attention. A bond of affection develops between the characters. Dorota faces a dilemma. Knowing the lifestyle of seafaring families, she has promised herself she would never become involved with a man who goes to sea. But now her heart tells her something completely different… Will she dare to follow his lead?”
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The moment I first saw bladderwrack
2026, intarsia (Karelian birch, steel), 34×24 cm
I first saw a bladderwrack in Norway in 2022. It was the Norwegian Sea – northern Norway, near the Arctic Circle. The coastal bladderwrack meadows breathed with the tide. They were multi-species meadows; I saw Fucus vesiculosus, Fucus serratus, Palmaria palmata and many other organisms. The water height differences were significant, so at low tide, the bladderwrack lay in slowly drying, water-heavy meadows. At high tide, it suddenly began to dance underwater, rising lightly and quickly thanks to its buoyant gas-filled swim bladders. The abundance of bladderwrack meadows was intoxicating, completely different from the sea I know best – a sea that is species-poor, much emptier, and much less transparent.
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High Tide
2026, intarsia (Karelian birch, steel), 24×55 cm
Seaweed – the common name for algae, a soft-bodied aquatic organism.
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Low Tide
2026, intarsia (Karelian birch, steel), 24×55 cm
Bladderwrack (Fucus vesiculosus), Forkbeard (Furcellaria lumbricalis) and seagrass are the three most important species that form underwater communities. Bladderwrack and Furcellaria tolerate low salinity well, hence the presence of these species in the Baltic Sea. These are the species that give rise to other species – they create habitats where fish, mussels, polychaetes, etc. can feed, shelter, and grow.
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Bladderwrack Drifting in the Sea
2026, intarsia (Poplar burl, California walnut burl, steel), 61 x 29 cm
In recent years, scientists from the Institute of Oceanology of the Polish Academy of Sciences have observed an increasing number of underwater aggregations of unanchored bladderwracks. These mats float in the sea and are not attached to the substrate. They provide habitat for species such as:
Forkbeard
Seagrass
Cockle
Mussel
European acorn barnacle
bryozoans
common jellyfish (Aurelia aurita)
variegated nereid
gammarus
American crab
devil’s hen
round goby
flounder
Straightnose pipefish
Broadnosed pipefish
In such habitats, fucus occurs in a drifting form—not attached to the substrate. In this form, fucus reproduces asexually—it is a clone of itself and reproduces by fission of its thallus. Genetic studies are underway to confirm the origin of these individuals, but they most likely did not arrive from other parts of the sea; they are simply increasing their populations locally. It can be observed that the fucus occurring in these habitats is preparing to begin sexual reproduction.
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Last branch of bladderwrack collected in 1977
2026, intarsia (poplar burl, California walnut burl, steel), 126 cm x 36 cm
In 1977, the last branch of bladderwrack observed by the researcher was collected by her for further study. Since then, despite extensive searches, no other attached bladderwrack has been found on the Polish coast.
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Bladderwrack Deep on the Seabed
2026, intarsia (Poplar Burl, Californian Walnut Burl, Steel), 101 cm x 35 cm
In the 1990s, attempts were made to reintroduce bladderwrack. Specimens were brought and immersed near the Orłowski Cliff, one of the few places on the Polish coast with a rocky bottom, necessary for fucus to anchor itself to the substrate. These attempts were unsuccessful. According to researchers from the Institute of Oceanology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the best thing that can currently be done for fucus is to leave it alone.
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Bottle Noses
2026, intarsia (Karelian Birch, Steel), 18 x 23 cm
Water smoothes bottle glass, sharp edges disappear, shapes round, sharp pieces of shattered bottles turn into rounded pebbles. Bottles are slowly losing their human-like appearance.
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Bottle Eyes
2026, intarsia, (Karelian birch, steel), 18 x 23 cm
The Baltic Sea is a sea from which European countries have extracted stones for centuries. In the 19th and 20th centuries, boulders were dredged en masse to be used in the construction of foundations, breakwaters, streets, etc. In many European countries, there was even a profession called “rock picker,” a practice that was banned in some countries at the end of the 20th century.
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Bottle Mouths
2026, intarsia (Karelian birch, steel), 20 x 20 cm
The hard subsoil in the Baltic Sea gradually disappeared, and with it, places where one could anchor to the ground.
However, from a coevolutionary perspective, the human species not only domesticated but was also domesticated. Following Stacy Alaimo’s call for increasing the visibility of “nonhuman agencies and trajectories” in Anthropocene narratives, I examine the Anthropocene past through the lens of a shared plant-human history, co-becoming, and sympoiesis. Following Ursula K. Heise’s observation that our human understanding of other beings and our relationship to them “becomes part of the stories that human societies tell about themselves: stories of origins, development, identity, and possible futures,” and Donna Haraway’s call for creating new stories about the interwoven histories and complex relationships of earthly beings (“It matters what stories shape worlds, what worlds tell stories”), I discuss the human desire for sunlight and the plant desire for mobility, satisfied only through multispecies and multifactorial relationships and intertwinings. The process of coevolution between plants and humans—the transformation of bodies and the satisfaction of desires—is fueled by the needs of biochemical products of photosynthesis on the human side and mobility that improves fertility on the plant side.
(Magdalena Zamorska, Bylica pospolita, “synfitonizm” i ekspozycje ludzko-roślinnych historii, Kultura Współczesna, 1(113/2021)
