Why Mermaids?
The divine feminine is a concept that seems largely lost in post-Christian western civilization. In most cases, organized religion seems to me to be an extension of the patriarchy (and I say that with some authority as a former seminarian). But in earlier times, people related to gods and goddesses as having a full range of what are commonly regarded as masculine and feminine traits. There are bits of this concept still around. There is a strong connection to the divine feminine in the Carnival tradition, but it is largely missing from everyday experience – which brings me to the Coney Island Mermaid Parade.
I stumbled on the Coney Island Mermaid Parade by accident. I was doing some family genealogy work at the Brooklyn Historical Society – trying to find some information about my grandfather who grew up in Coney Island. I found that my grandfather and the famous boardwalk in Coney Island both shared the same name. I have not been able to determine if my grandfather and Edward Riegelmann (the Brooklyn Borough President who build the eponymous boardwalk in the 30s) were related, but it is not a common name and the spelling was the same. Maybe I will get back to that some day.
In researching the boardwalk, I ran across a reference to the Mermaid Parade. The parade was started in 1983 by Dick Zigun, the former artistic director of Coney Island USA (a non-profit that has tried to connect Coney Island with some of its celebratory roots). It is billed as the country’s largest art parade and is inspired by the Mardi Gras parades that once took place there.
I had wanted to try photographing people after many years of obsessively photographing insects, birds, and fossils. The Mermaid Parade seemed like a great opportunity to make this happen – and it exceeded my expectations. It turned out to be a very immersive art experience – the kind that challenges me to be more creative. The parade also hit me on another level. The Mermaid Parade is art and it is also marketing (officially opening the ocean on the summer solstice). However, being there, it is hard to escape the expression of the divine feminine.