Life Under The Sea

318 pieces

Only the fourteenth puzzle I ever cut, this was the first one that I became very “adventurous” with. I took four pictures from a calendar of Barbara Wallace prints, re-arranged some of the fish, and connected the sections together in a way that makes you not realize that they came from separate prints. The fish are cut using an “earlet” style; the black sections connecting the fish are cut in a “nightmare” style. I took some of the black sections and “double-cut” some pieces, such that one of those pieces will fit perfectly into two different pieces! And since those pieces are all flat black, you can’t tell which piece is the correct mate. The result is that the fish can be arranged in many ways, but only one way will complete a circle as shown below.

This puzzle was entered in Paul Revere Insurance Company’s exhibit as part of Tufts Health Plans’s On My Own Time ’93 showcase. It won Best Of Show at Paul Revere’s exhibit, moving on to the regional exhibit held on January 10-28 1993 in Boston, Mass. There it won a Regional Exhibit award (given to about 10% of the 504 works that were at the regional exhibit).

Quoting the program of Tufts Health Plan’s Own My Own Time 1993 regional exhibit in Boston:

Tufts Health Plans’s Own My Own Time ’93 is a program designed to showcase the creative talents and leisure time interestes of our workforce. The companies participating in our fifth annual On My Own Time program share our view that a well-balanced lifestyle contributes to the health of individuals and corporate community. This mixed-media collection of 504 pieces of work is representative of thousands of works exhibited at 47 corporate locations. On My Own Time ’93 is an inspiring kaleidoscope of what working people do “on their own time”.