‘Moon Snail House’ artwork overlooks the strait in Nanaimo

A new sculpture at Pipers Lagoon Park pays tribute to Snuneymuxw First Nation culture and a sea creature indigenous to Nanaimo.

Moon Snail House, a temporary artwork by Amber Morrison and Matthew Fox, was unveiled at the north Nanaimo park Saturday, Aug. 24, adjacent to the beach near the park’s entrance and facing the Salish Sea.

Morrison and Fox said they were inspired by the Lewis’s moon snail, a large sea snail common off Nanaimo’s waters and in Hul’qumi’num is referred to as Qume:ne’ (Kuh-may-nay). Turquoise in colour and made of fibreglass and steel, with a bench inside, Morrison told the News Bulletin many factors were considered when conceptualizing the work.

“I was thinking about different creatures that are in our local intertidal zones, maybe something a little less stereotypical than the orcas or eagles … I started looking at Department of Fisheries and Oceans maps, and realized, this is the territory of the moon snail, as is most of the West Coast,” said Morrison.

The colour matches Moon Snail House’s location, according to Morrison.

“We were thinking a combination of land and sea colours, right? So the blues and the greens mingling, but we wanted to make it something not too unnatural, because we didn’t want it to stick out too much in the landscape,” she said. “We just wanted it to have its own colour, but still refer to the place.” 

Morrison said Fox and her father Terry, a structural steel engineer, made and moulded Moon Snail House.

“Matthew and I, we collaborated on a lot of projects,” said Morrison. “He walked by my desk and went, ‘Can I clean up that sketch?’ and made that 3D render based on that. So we spit-balled the idea back and forth … and [her father] and Matthew went back and forth on the construction, and I was the ideas person who kept checking in.”

Given Moon Snail House is by the water, Morrison said it is built to handle the elements.

“It’s got a steel core frame, so it’s reinforced all the way around with multiple layers of fibreglass and a completely metal bench seat, so it’s as durable as we can make it for the setting,” said Morrison. “It’s an epoxy paint that has a hardener built into it, so it’s a little more tough.”

Morrison said Moon Snail House also seeks to bring awareness about the creature’s reproductive patterns, as it lays eggs in a “sand collar,” often discarded by beach-goers who mistake it for trash. 

During his speech, Fox said the materials had a symbolic significance as well, as steel and fibreglass are used to make boats and it was a “good intersection between land and sea.”

As part of City of Nanaimo’s temporary art program, Moon Snail House will be on display till the end of 2027, said Jaime-Brett Sine, city culture coordinator.

“Usually it would be returned to the artist, unless the city chose to purchase it at that point and bring it into the permanent public art collection,” Sine said.