Melissa Cronin

The squid’s eye is trained on the camera, dilating to the size of a saucer as it steadily draws nearer. Its skin looks as soft as satin, rippling delicately as it siphons water into its mantle. Just a few feet under the surface, its long tentacles, each a girthy strip of vermillion tie-dye, sewed up with an endless avenue of suckers, hover listlessly. The slow intake of a diver’s respirator, followed by the tinkle of a stream of bubbles, is the only noise in the video.