Mo Ganji: Angelshark | Engelshai | Squatina squatina | No. 010/250 from work group 8/99

Angelshark | Engelshai | Squatina squatina

In a single, continuous line, Mo Ganji outlines the angelshark — a flat-bodied, near-motionless predator adapted to the seafloor of the eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The line does not claim to capture the animal’s full reality; rather, it offers one possible conceptual form, echoing Ganji’s view that every being can be understood as a configuration of ideas, of which the line is only one expression. The result is a reduction that leaves space for interpretation while still pointing toward the shark’s distinctive silhouette.

Squatina squatina is listed as Critically Endangered (CR) on the IUCN Red List. Once common along European coasts — from Norway to the Canary Islands and throughout the Mediterranean — it has vanished from most of its former range. The primary threat is bycatch in trawl, gillnet and longline fisheries; its benthic lifestyle makes it highly vulnerable to bottom-contact fishing gear. Slow reproduction and low population growth further hinder recovery.

Ganji’s minimal rendering reflects this precarious situation without overstating it: a species reduced to isolated pockets, known to science yet increasingly absent from its historical waters. The single line becomes a quiet marker of presence — an acknowledgment that what remains observable today may soon disappear if the pressures on coastal ecosystems persist.