The Bolinas Museum invites you to the opening of new exhibitions focused on ocean health, the urgent issue of our time, next Saturday, Oct. 1. Oceans cover 71 percent of our planet, provide half of our global oxygen and influence all our weather patterns. The exhibition “Pacific Rise: Ocean Health” focuses on the wonder of the marine world and the current age of destructive human impact on the planet—the Anthropocene epoch—and expresses urgency, hope and ideas that can empower us to be proactive in changing our collective human behavior. 

Thought provoking, educational for all ages and visually exciting, the exhibition presents the work of West Marin and Bay Area artists and the engaging writings of Bay Area scientists, specialists and representatives from diverse organizations that are committed to research, education and conservation. Programming throughout the exhibition includes free public events with local and internationally recognized scientists and creatives. 

In the museum’s Coastal Marin Artists Gallery, the solo exhibition, “Laurie Mahan Sawyer: Seeing the Unseen” presents fine art and scientific illustration that focuses on species and habitats of the local marine ecosystem. Laurie Mahan Sawyer, a longtime Point Reyes Station resident, dedicates her art to engaging and educating viewers. Her illustration of a marine eelgrass meadow offers the fun challenge of finding 30 species in the artwork. Sawyer is a graduate of the Art Center College of Design and California State University, Monterey Bay. She has collaborated with such organizations as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration at Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary and the Marin Resource Conservation District.

The theme of ocean health continues in the museum’s permanent collection gallery and history room. These exhibitions center on the northern California coast but also address global oceanic issues, calling us to join people of all ages and backgrounds who are actively working to mitigate the human-caused degradation of the ocean’s health. These exhibitions encourage us to make daily choices that nurture and protect our natural world. As stewards of all the complex and interdependent ecosystems of the planet, we have an opportunity to chart a different course. Will we rise to the challenge?

On Saturday, Oct. 1, the museum will open at noon. At 2 p.m., please join us in the courtyard for talks by Laurie Mahan Sawyer and artist and bird expert Keith Hansen, followed by a reception from 3 to 5 p.m. As always, admission to museum exhibitions and openings is always free. Don’t miss this special opening event!

Elia Haworth is the curator of coastal Marin art and history for the Bolinas Museum.