May Babcock
An artist who gives voice to waterways by turning seaweed, sediment, and plants into paper.
MessageMacroalgae Series
Foraged seaweeds are embedded in paper pulp by the artist during the wet hand papermaking process. Seaweed and pulp are pressed and dried together, resulting in an extraordinarily detailed preservation of the aquatic species.
Ocean flora is layered inside a natural, organic, tactile, imperfect, translucent handmade paper complete with feathery 'deckled edges.'
Macroalgae started as an innovative identification method while researching aquatic plant and algae species for paper fiber in Rhode Island waterways.
My artwork acts as witness to local ecologies and poignant evidence of human activity, while celebrating the beauty found in natural forms.
This Artwork
This rockweed (Ascophyllum nodosum) sample was collected from Moonstone Beach in South Kingstown, Rhode Island.
The orange-brown you see is essentially an ‘eco-print’ of bladderwrack, which happened when I pressed the wet sheets in my press. The ‘dye’ from the bladderwrack seeped through and made the ‘print’.
- Inventory Number: MM1419