Jellyfish and Isolation: A Connection to Covid-19

Abstract

Opening Paragraph|I painted this Atlantic Sea Nettle, native to the East Coast, a few months ago as part of a series of jellyfish paintings. At the time, it was an experiment in colors, a challenge to balance the vibrant hues of the jellyfish to the darker, empty sea and evolved as a multimedia project using acrylic paint and white gel pen, along with stacked paint for texture in the oral arms of the jellyfish and splattering technique used for the algae. Little did I realize how much it would come to the surface of my mind when the COVID-19 pandemic hit like a snowball to the face. Jellyfish have always seemed lonely to me, beautiful but drifting aimlessly through the ocean. Larger jellyfish such as this sea nettle are solitary and rarely seen in groups. They float, seemingly distanced from other life, and this connected strongly to what seems to be a shared feeling of loneliness brought about by the necessary self-isolation. When COVID-19 hit, life turned upside down, students were uprooted from their everyday college lives, parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents lost jobs as the economy shut down and everyone had to rapidly adjust to a new way of life.