On June 27, a fish walked along the Kaag in Lisbon, near the pavilion where the Ocean Conference of the United Nations was currently taking place. The fish wore a smart suit and polished shoes. In his right hand he held a dead congener, in his left he carried a black briefcase that read in white letters: ‘War on fish’. On closer inspection, the fish was injured: its head appeared to have been brutally chopped off, its entrails were hanging out at the back. Yet here he walked proudly and resolutely along the wharf, as if he were the fish’s advocate, the counselor of ocean life, no doubt carrying in his briefcase a scathing indictment of grueling man.
What a picture. The Portuguese photographer Pedro Nunes, who works for the Reuters news agency, shot it from a journalistic point of view. Reuters captioned it something like: “An Ocean Rebellion activist walks to the demonstration against what protesters describe as a ‘war on the fish’ in Lisbon.” Factual and objective, as it should be.
And yes of course: we also see a man here with a self-made fish head on his head. Yet, in spite of all reality, this scene could not but produce a miraculous image. They saw that at Reuters as well; on the website it was grouped under the heading ‘craziest photos of the week’. I myself had opted for ‘enchantingly effective’. Because it is not often that a news photo is so convincingly different, such a credible fusion of reality and imagination. As if it were perfectly natural for a fish to have temporarily climbed ashore to seek redress from those who disturb its natural habitat.
That was, of course, exactly the intention of the activists. Ocean Rebellion is a group of climate activists, which emerged in 2020 from Extinction Rebellion, who use nonviolent demonstrations and guerrilla actions to draw attention to overfishing, deep-sea drilling and other human actions that disrupt life and biodiversity in the oceans. The founders are the British Rob Higgs and Sophie Miller, both artists. So it’s no coincidence that Ocean Rebellion’s demonstrations often look like they’re going through a ring, or rather, a photo camera.
For example, earlier (during the G7 summit in 2021) blue sea creatures washed up on the beach were entangled in fishing nets and a cute wooden Viking ship, bearing the text ‘As the sea dies we die’. Later that same ship was on fire and in the foreground a money-throwing Boris Johnson was ridden by the Fossil Fuel Fool, a man with a jerry can for the head.
“All our actions are creative and theatrical,” Miller told a Portuguese newspaper reporter last week Expresso† Ocean Rebellion’s ‘performative activism’ should produce such beautiful and disruptive images that people become emotionally involved with the subject.
In the case of this resolute fish, at least as far as I’m concerned, it succeeded. Although I no longer need to be convinced of the seriousness of the climate crisis, I still tend to look away from photos of melting ice caps, plastic soup and extreme drought. Their journalistic value is undisputed, but they usually have a paralyzing effect, making them despondent. What should I do with it, what can I do about it?
The fairy fish with the briefcase full of papers gave me a well-aimed bang for my kanis. The vigor, the anger—I was just as touched as I was eight years ago, when Julia Roberts gave Mother Nature a voice in a short film addressing humanity chillingly superior: “Your actions will determine your own destiny, not mine.” . I am ready to change. And you?’
That wasn’t real either, no. But so effective.