Suspended in the midnight waters of the Weeki Wachee River on Florida’s Gulf Coast, the titular ‘mermaid’ of Michael Dweck’s 2007 photograph represents a connection to the past, and honours a long lineage of ‘river children’. Once underwater – where she can hold her breath for many minutes – her isolated glide into blackness is an absolute escape. Form follows function into fluidity, and history washes away into myth. This variant of Mermaid 18 has not been previously editioned, published or exhibited.

Michael Dweck is an American visual artist best known for a series of narrative photography projects that explore on-going struggles between identity and adaptation in endangered societal enclaves. Monographs include The End: Montauk, NY (2004), Mermaids (2008), and Habana Libre (2011). His current project, Blunderbust, explores all angles of a small-stakes Long Island racetrack via an ambitious mélange of photography, sculpture, installation, abstract painting, and a feature-length documentary.