Mo Ganji: Green Sawfish | Grüner Sägerochen | Pristis zijsron | No. 092/250 from work group 8/99

Green Sawfish | Grüner Sägerochen | Pristis zijsron

Mo Ganji’s single line traces the Green sawfish — a large coastal ray with an elongated, toothed rostrum adapted to shallow marine and estuarine waters — through a gesture of concentrated reduction. The continuous line offers a spare contour that signals presence without fixing the form to a single meaning. In this restraint, the being can be encountered before the mind settles on category, function or spectacle.

Pristis zijsron is listed as Critically Endangered (CR) on the IUCN Red List. Once widespread across the Indo-West Pacific, from the eastern coast of Africa to Southeast Asia and Australia, the species has disappeared from much of its former range. Remaining populations are extremely fragmented and occur at very low densities.

The primary threats include entanglement in fishing gear, targeted capture, coastal habitat degradation, and the loss of shallow nursery areas such as mangroves and estuaries. The sawfish’s distinctive rostrum makes it especially vulnerable to nets, while its slow growth and low reproductive rate severely limit recovery. Even where legal protection exists, enforcement challenges persist.

Ganji’s single line opens a space in which the sawfish can be sensed beyond its dramatic outline or its status as a conservation icon. It invites attention to a presence shaped by movement along coasts and river mouths, quietly reminding us that human attempts to control and extract from coastal waters often erase the conditions that sustain life — and that our own futures remain inseparable from the fragile margins where land and sea meet.