RED LIST: REEF BUILDING CORALS GROUP EXHIBIT
Acropora Rudis Coral, a painting I just finished, is accepted into Ghost Gallery's upcoming show on coral conservation!
I believe this is the first coral colony I've painted, aside from making dioramas for fun as a child. It was freeing and fun to paint one of these underwater animals. I'd forgotten what it was like to not take musculature and bony processes into account. I may paint more endangered corals.
From NOAA Fisheries, "Acropora rudis is a species of coral likely found in the central and eastern Indian Ocean from the Maldives to the western-most portion of Indonesia...Acropora rudis forms colonies made up by many individual polyps that grow together...Acropora rudis gets food from photosynthetic algae that live inside the coral's cells. It also feeds by capturing plankton with its polyp’s tentacles."