The New England Aquarium is a public aquarium located in Boston, Massachusetts. The species exhibited include harbor and northern fur seals, California sea lions, African and southern rockhopper penguins, giant Pacific octopuses, weedy seadragons, and thousands of saltwater and freshwater fishes. In addition to the main aquarium building, attractions at Central Wharf include the Simons Theatre and the New England Aquarium Whale Watch. More than 1.3 million guests visited the aquarium each year prior to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium conducts long-running research on the North Atlantic right whale, and its Quincy Animal Care Center rescues and rehabilitates hundreds of sea turtles annually. History Boston has had multiple aquariums since the 1880s, the last before the New England Aquarium being the South Boston Aquarium at Marine Park, which closed its doors in the 1950s. As part of the city’s goal of revitalizing the waterfront, a new, modern aquarium, designed by Peter Chermayeff of Cambridge Seven Associates, was planned starting in 1962. David B. Stone led the project as President of the New England Aquarium Corporation. The brutalist concrete building with its cavernous interior was opened to the public in 1969. The Giant Ocean Tank, a cylindrical exhibit made of concrete and glass, opened in 1970. In 1974, a purpose-built, multi-storied barge, Discovery, was moored next to Central Wharf. As the aquarium’s location on the wharf limited its ability to expand, Discovery served as a floating addition containing a 1,000-seat amphitheater overlooking a saltwater pool for marine mammals. In addition to the aquarium's first California sea lions, bottlenose dolphins performed there until they were transferred in the mid-1990s. The aging Discovery was finally decommissioned in the mid-2000s due to rising maintenance costs. The new West Wing, designed by Schwartz/Silver Architects, was completed in 1998. The glass and steel addition to the original concrete building also included a new gift shop and the Harbor View Café. The 428-seat Matthew and Marcia Simons IMAX Theatre opened in 2001 in a separate building on Central Wharf designed by E. Verner Johnson and Associates. A renovation in 2020 replaced the IMAX system with a digital projector capable of showing 2D and 3D films on the theatre's new by screen. The current theatre seats 378 and has a stage for hosting special events. Also in 2020, contemporary artist Shepard Fairley designed and painted