Oh Brave New World That Has Such Seas in It

Artist’s Statement: This picture was taken last summer on a black sand beach in Maui, Hawaii. Surrounding the beach were small picturesque caves partially flooded with water from the ocean. The ocean crashing into a cave caught my attention, but people would not move out of my way for me to take a picture. In my mind, the person in my picture is insignificant; the presence of a person in my picture shows people’s insignificance compared to the ocean and the world.
The title of my picture “Oh Brave New World That Has Such Seas In It” is homage to the quote from the book Brave New World (Aldous Huxley), “O brave new world that has such people in it.” Huxley was himself quoting Shakespeare’s The Tempest; a tempest is a big storm. The vast ocean represents the unknown as we look out from a cave, our safety, into choppy waters, a mystifying future, looking for the storm that’s always brewing.