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Realised between 2017–2018 across: Saudi Arabia, the Russian Federation, Turkey, the Republic of Korea, Norway and the UK, Watercolour (2017–2018) was an international (e)mail art project in which five pieces of white A4 paper were placed on five coloured seas around the world – the Red Sea, Yellow Sea, White Sea, Black Sea & green(land) sea – by participating artists and scientists to create five conceptual ‘watercolours’. Invited to contribute to the project through email, participants performed the action of laying their paper substrate against the surface of their nearest ‘coloured’ water mass. Once the paper had dried, each participant sent their contribution to the UK, in an envelope, using their closest postal service. On their arrival into the UK, each substrate was chemically analysed for (a)biotic trace elements using an XRF spectrometer (a non-destructive test that quantifiably determines material composition). Over the duration of the project, contributions were received from: Dr Ramona Marasco at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia; Professor Alexander Tzetlin, Dr Anna Zhadan, Dr Nickolay Usov, and Konstantin Biyagov at The White Sea Biological Station, the Russian Federation; Professor Ali Muzaffer Feyzioglu at Karadeniz Technical University, Turkey; Nick Hobbs, an artist based in Istanbul, Turkey; Yujin Ju, an artist based in Seoul, The Republic of Korea; and Professor Lena Håkansson at The University Centre in Svalbard, Norway.