Reknown for her extraordinary magical imagery, Zena Holloway is an artist who has taken humanity and the etherial into the underworld to new watery depths.

Born in 1973, this daughter of an airline pilot found inspiration to work underwater behind a camera at the age of 18 while on a diving holiday in Egypt.

Not all artificial reefs are shipwrecks or scuttled vessels, tanks or planes. Now divers can enjoy artificial reefs growing on original sculptures mounted underwater. Jason Taylor, a sculptor from England, recently finished a photo-documentation of his underwater sculpture project in Grenada. X-RAY MAG caught up with Taylor to find out how and why he did it.

Located 386km (250 miles) southwest of the tip of Baja California and over 720km (446 miles) west of Manzanillo, the Revillagigedos are one of three Mexican island groups in the Pacific Ocean. All four islands that make up the Revillagigedos Archipelago are remote, volcanic in origin and offer some of the most unpredictable, wild diving in the world.

Erythra Thalassa—Red Sea, as directly translated from the ancient Greek name—is what it was called by the ancient Romans as well. Long has this great body of water been a focal point of trade in the Middle East, which has stood as a crossroads between Europe, Asia and Africa for many thousands of years. The Red Sea, today, is still an important vehicle of global trade as well as a major tourist destination for millions.

In the heart of the Middle East, occupying 80 percent of the eastern shoreline of the Red Sea, sits the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It covers an area of over 870, 000 square miles, almost all of which is desert, which holds more than a quarter of the world’s oil reserves. Despite its close proximity to Egypt and Sudan—places that are considered by many people to be some of the world’s greatest diving locations—the reefs around Saudi Arabia have barely been dived.

There is something special about it, the Red Sea, that I have not found anywhere else on the planet. Granted every destination has its own, but here there is this special ambience of timeless mystique, of remoteness and rugged adventure that just hangs thick in the atmosphere with a whiff of historical greatness and millenias past, topped up with a scent of spices and a distant smell of charcoal from a campfire, or perhaps a sisha—a waterpipe.

The sun was just greeting the day as I hurried to the top deck of our cruise boat with a steaming hot cup of coffee in one hand and a camera in the other. I was alone, enjoying the splender of another Egyptian morning. Wispy veils of fog danced across the Nile’s glassy surface, slowly dissipating as the sun’s rays enveloped the distant mountains and countryside. As I sipped my cup of java, I wondered how many of Egypt’s nobility had once come this way.

The Maori warrior cautiously moved towards us. His face was painted and body adorned in traditional combatant attire. He yelled words I did not understand and pounded the ground with his spear-like weapon to challenge us. More warriors appeared out of the darkness behind him, each taking defensive positions with wide eyes and tongues out to intimidate. Like the other visitors around me, I froze with excitement, waiting for their next move.

Beautifully located on the coast of the Ligurian Sea, and just opposite Elba Island, we find the Italian port of Follonica, with its busy side streets, many small seafood restaurants and religious processions on holidays. Not much, if anything, gives away that this port town is also the hot spot for technical diving in Italy. Follonica is the home of Dive System, one of the new rising stars in dive manufacturing.

Blending her love of the sea and its cherished creatures with the ancient art of Batik, a die and wax technique on silk, Sue Dudas has created an ocean of art work to delight the most hardy sea lover.