Opening | Soiree | Paddle Out | Wake | Broward College | Helker’s Island | Bakehouse | Kona Kai
Press Release
February 6, 2015
contact: Joe Harris, Executive Director @ 305-393-2504
Seagrass meadows, like those here in the Florida Keys are as important as any tropical rainforest when it comes to sequestering carbon, producing oxygen and providing food and shelter for an untold number of creatures. And, they are as threatened as the rainforests.
“Saving the Seagrasses – Littoral Creatures” is Miami Environmental Artist Xavier Cortada’s effort to draw attention to the ongoing threats to South Florida’s seagrasses. Cortada’s “Littoral Creatures” draws attention to the creatures that make the seagrass and surrounding waters their home.
“Most of us don’t see plants, we see the animals around the plants; this is called “plant blindness™. Therefore, to bring attention to the importance of the world’s seagrass beds, I focused my creative efforts on the many creatures that depend on seagrass for their survival,” says Cortada. By highlighting some of the many sea creatures we humans love, Cortada hopes people will come to understand the importance of protecting the underwater plants that provide their shelter and food; plants rarely noticed by us – the seagrass.
The exhibit, a mixture of acrylic paintings and drawings on carbon paper opens on Saturday, February 14th at The Gallery on the grounds of The Botanic Gardens at Kona Kai Resort, mm 97.8 bayside. The Gallery is open to the public daily from 10am to 6pm. All artwork is for sale with the proceeds benefiting The Botanic Gardens at Kona Kai Resort and their Upper Keys Fairchild Challenge student education program which has, this year, enrolled over 1000 students and 73 teachers from most every upper Keys school.
The Gallery at The Botanic Gardens at Kona Kai Resort, seeks to Promote Environmental Understanding through Art. This exhibit will be available on our website, www.kkbg.org on February 14th, along with previous exhibits. It will be on display through August 30th, 2015.
“Littoral Creatures” was originally created by Xavier Cortada to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of the Biscayne Bay Aquatic Preserve, established in 1974.
The Botanic Gardens at Kona Kai Resort, a 501c3 non-profit, offers a 90 minute TYUP™ tour about “Why Plants Matter,” Tuesday through Saturday at 10am. And, through our affiliation with CWS, we offer a 2 hour “Enviro-Tour” of Florida Bay where one can directly experience many littoral creatures and see the seagrass meadows first hand. Reservations are required, please call 305-852-9766.
TYUP™ = “Transforming Your Understanding of Plants.”
The intertidal area, also called the littoral zone, is where land and sea meet, between the high and low tide zones; a complex marine ecosystem found along coastlines worldwide. The Littoral zone is rich in nutrients and oxygen making it the preferred home to a variety of organisms referred to as Littoral Creatures.