Skafandro

This is the helmet of a Greek Sponge Diver, called “Skafandro”. The profession of diving for collecting Sponges, grew in the mid-19th to early 20th century in the Dodecanese islands, including Kalymnos, a Greek South East Aegean island, which is one of my origins. Having a steep terrain, not easy to cultivate, the annual journeys of Sponge harvesters starting in Spring and lasting until Autumn, were a necessary means for livelihood. Divers, originally dived to a depth of up to 30 meters holding a heavy marble stone. Then, in 1863, a novel diving technique, scuba diving, was introduced, with which a diver, fully clothed, could dive to the bottom of the sea and stay for a longer time so as to collect more Sponges. A manual air pump with pistons brought air to the diver's helmet during Sponge harvesting and throughout the uprising of the diver to the Sea’s surface. Numerous deaths and paralysis (“divers' illness”), have been recorded due to this process. In fact, a branch of Medicine, Diving Medicine, is based on exactly these effects of air embolism caused by bubbles of air entering the circulatory system, or the alike decompression sickness. In the 1920s, a new mechanism was applied, including an airbag on the diver’s back, combining the advantages of the method of early “naked” divers with the one of divers wearing the “Skafandro”. Trade of sponges, has passed as a tradition from generation to generation. They are purchased for use in the health and cosmetics industry all over the world while the harvesting of sponges is made in a sustainable way, so as to ensure their re-creation and maintenance of their species. Nowadays, much more advanced techniques are utilized, but this Sponge Diver Helmet is set on the window of my friends’ working place in Kalymnos and teaches us to respect the pure efforts of our ancestries.