Andros Coral Reef (Diorama)

Summary

When the Andros Coral Reef diorama was completed in 1935, it was acclaimed as a model of modern engineering and exhibition technology. Created from 40 tons of coral collected from the bottom of the sea in The Bahamas, the only two-story diorama in the Museum is supported by an intricate web of steel. It took 12 years and five underwater expeditions led by Roy Waldo Miner, then the Museum’s Curator of Living Invertebrates, to transplant 30 feet of ocean floor to a Museum gallery. The diorama preserves a slice of the Andros Coral Reef as it existed in the 1930s. Francis Lee Jaques, painted the skyscape above the islands of Andros and Goat Cay for the diorama’s second story. Underwater scenes were recorded with cameras in watertight boxes—and even painted in oils by Chris Olsen, who dove and painted preliminary sketches of the sunlight-dappled reef and its waters on an oiled canvas stretched over a sheet of glass on a weighted easel. Olsen was assisted by modeler Bruce C. Brunner, colorist W. H. Southwick, scientist-artist George H. Childs, and glassblower Herman Mueller during expeditions. It was later renovated in 2003. (“Andros Coral Reef Diorama”, AMNH website, accessed May 5, 2022)

Topics

• AMNH Dioramas