Cornwalls Turquoise Seas are Bright for a reason…
Most of you will know how much I love the ocean, I love how it continuously changes how it looks throughout the day; from crystal clear waters in the early hours to dark, velvety, blue waves at dusk. It’s my number one source for inspiration and the main focus of my paintings is to reconnect the viewer to nature and hopefully allow them to slow down and feel a sense of serenity. One thing I love most about Cornwall is how turquoise the ocean is, I love giving my paintings that ‘Aqua Pop’ that you so often see down in Cornwall on a sunny day. The other day I read an article which I was truly fascinated by, it was all about the water off the coast of Cornwall appearing to be super bright on satellite images compared to the rest of the surrounding ocean. NASA reports this might be due to an unexpectedly large and intense bloom of phytoplankton. Phytoplankton are microscopic plant-like organisms that live in water. They have a critical purpose as they generate half of the atmosphere's oxygen and are the base of the food chain in the oceans. NASA wrote: "Spring and early summer 2020 brought unusually clear skies and persistent, unseasonable heat to northwestern Europe. Those conditions likely set the stage for large and persistent blooms of phytoplankton in the waters around the United Kingdom and Ireland. On June 23, 2020, the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 acquired natural-colour imagery of a massive phytoplankton bloom off the coast of southwestern England”.
So not only is our Cornish Sea beautiful in it’s turquoise appearance, it’s also super healthy for marine life!
