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I don’t know diddly squat about art….in technical terms. I fancy the way it looks, and I love the way it makes me feel. It challenges me to do more than think, but to project who I am off of the piece that I’m observing. Everything you observe has a piece of you in it because you are experiencing it. Who cares what the artist(s) was thinking, what am I thinking? How do I feel? Can I catch my breath or do I just want to run away? Can I force myself to stay or am I weeping because its too much for my soul to handle in one take? ….somethings are so beautiful its hard to bear.
So, when did this become about art? As soon as I decided to build something, I just didn’t know how entranced I would become with making things or how involved I would get with my trash. I share an intimate relationship with the products I use, I’m not talking sex toys, but with the things I throw away and with the things I purchase. Now, everything I spend money on (or acquire for free) has a story, has a journey and a destiny and I become the gatekeeper to its fate. Yes, just like in ghostbusters. The product is the key and I’m the person that makes the decisions on which door its going through. On one end, it goes to the trash and ultimately ends up in a landfill. On another end, I throw some glue on the bottom and build something kooky while listening to Peaches…and then its going to be raunchy out the wazoo. On ANOTHER end, I reuse it in another way, incorporate it into my everyday life and deter away from buying something shiny that will break and need to be replaced (just like its supposed to). OR I do something else with it, whatever comes to mind, but as long as I’m not selecting the first option without considering all other options I feel peachy keen.
This project was my attempt to demonstrate how recycling should be the last choice. We must first REDUSE, then REUSE, and as a last resort RECYCLE. With that being said, being conscious of our purchasing and wasting habits is crucial. Secondly, we must be aware that there are OPTIONS! Remember, one woman’s trash is another woman’s treasure. We have the option to change, adapt and alter the things we use and turn them into something that is new. In the same light as recycling combined with reusing, we have the option to create and make art. This kind of art is unconventional, its raw and unyielding…just the way I like it. This kind of art has the potential to make you a more conscious person all around and can ultimately change your world, like it did mine. I’ve found a new solace through this experience and I couldn’t be more appreciative.
In addition to transforming yourself, art, especially eco-art can make a statement and can also help people in many different ways. Viewing art is nice, but its docile. Healing can come from participation and what better way to engage in participation, than to show your work and to work with others.
Art can change things, and its definitely not just for the elite….oh and there are multiple truths in my opinion. essentialism can suck it. check out this article: http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/28/arts/does-art-change-things-or-people.html
ART IS THERAPEUTIC! You bet your sweet ass it is, check it: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1506781/A-brush-with-art-helps-people-cope-with-the-pain-and-anxiety-of-cancer-says-study.html
In reference to the second article, art can heal. It can help people and in my attempts, it can help the planet. It can be complex, simple, structured or falling apart, the point is that it can be whatever you want it to be. Aside from music, I’m hard pressed to find many other things out there that have the same repertoire.
I loved this project and I’m excited to showcase my work later today. Peace, Love and Captain Planet for life. Chyeah!
I keep mentioning this concept of “Found Object Art,” which I figured was pretty self-explanatory, but after doing more research I have found that there are multiple interpretations for this concept so I would like to share my findings to clear up any loose ends.
What is found art?
Art that is found. Most contemporary artists now interpret this as rediscovered, refurbished, repurposed, or reused. It may be that you are looking at something left on the side of a street, thinking, “Why did they throw that out? It just needs a paint job.” You, the artist, find an irresistable object in a store, on the street, in your friend’s garage while you are helping to get ready for a yard sale, or under your bed.
Some found objects are created in the fury and frenzy of artistic creation. In the excitement of creating a found art piece, some artists deconstruct items in their home or will use objects in their immediate vicinity to assist in evoking emotions felt at the time or powerful concepts. Found Object Art is created by the use of everyday or truly found objects, given purpose and significance by those who find and conceptuallize them into artwork.
Is Found Art Modern Art? History into Contemporary Art
Found Art is thought to have practicing origins from the artist Marcel Duchamp, whose readymade works were controversial for the turn of the twentieth century. He created such famous works as Fountain and Bottle Rack.
Around the time of Pablo Picasso’s cubist phase of creation, Picasso also employed the use of found objects, such as La Petite Chouette (an owl constructed from found objects), which was made from household and building materials, including screws, pliers, a missing piece of a sauce pan, and pliers. The piece is said to have sold in 2000 for over one million dollars. Picasso’s piece was grounded in expressing the emotions he felt at the moment of creation.
Female artists had their hands in the beginnings of found art as well. Louise Nelson created unique three-dimensional sculptures from wood in the 1930s.
Dadaists (ManRay as a prime mover) and Surrealists incorporated found objects into their practices. Post-Modernists or Contemporary works carry on the tradition today with variants and combinations of preoccuring art movements, with new subgenres, such as Steampunk, Assemblage, and Junk Art. Both Found Art and its subgenre Assemblage have a relation to collage, of which Picasso is a famous practitioner. Rauschenberg’s paintings are a dynamic combination of flat surface with protruding found objects, resulting in a common connection between everyday life and art as more than association.
Duchamp, Hirst, ManRay, Picasso, Nelson, Koons, Scwhitters. These are but a few of the names that assisted in the success, persistence, and development of Found Art as a movement.
The development of Found Art can also be seen in mainstream consumerism and the efforts of society to Go Green. Used Rubber USA, an intriguing example, takes used tires and reuses them, in the form of stylish wallets, ID holders, briefcases, and other forms.
Found Art is Not True Art? The Critics
Throughout its development as an art movement and practice, Found Art has faced criticism. Duchamp’s Fountain (an unusable urinal) was rejected in 1917 by the Society of Independent Artists as not true art. There are still those today who view Found Art and other related movements as a not a true form of art. Yet many, like Damien Hirst, suggest that even traditional forms of art are truly Found Art. (Paint is transformed into its medium by scientific and biological means and placed on a canvas, given significance by the artist and the viewer.)
There were those before the Modern art era who recognized the potential of turning everyday objects into fine art. We see it in the conceptual, aesthetic, and philosophical writings from the Greeks into the modern period. But what is Found Art?
The beauty of this movement is that is left up to the artist, who gives the found object its own life through the artist’s concept. An object that has undergone its own period of existence and use has its own readymade signficance of which the artist taps into or chooses to ignore.
KEY: FOUND ART CAN INCORPORATE ANY FOUND OBJECT. You don’t have to use items that just look neat, get messy, get creative, throw in something that smells funny, do what you do.
Read more at Suite101: What is Found Object Art? An Overview http://artsociety.suite101.com/article.cfm/what-is-found-object-art-a-simple-overview#ixzz0n8uNnDTu
So, now that we’re all experts in found art, what is Assemblage art???
Assemblage Art
Art form in which natural and manufactured, traditionally non-artistic, materials and objets trouvés are assembled into three-dimensional structures. As such it is closely related to Collage, and like collage it is associated with Cubism, although its origins can be traced back beyond this. As much as by the materials used, it can be characterized by the way in which they are treated. In an assemblage the banal, often tawdry materials retain their individual physical and functional identity, despite artistic manipulation. The term was coined by Jean Dubuffet in 1953 to refer to his series of butterfly-wing collages and series of lithographs based on paper collages, which date from that year. Although these were in fact collages, he felt that that term ought to be reserved for the collage works of Braque, Picasso and the Dadaists of the period between 1910 and 1920. By 1954 Dubuffet had extended the term to cover a series of three-dimensional works made from primarily natural materials and objects. The concept of assemblage was given wide public currency by the exhibition The Art of Assemblage at MOMA, New York, in 1961. This included works by nearly 140 international artists, including Braque, Joseph Cornell, Dubuffet, Marcel Duchamp, Picasso, Robert Rauschenberg, Man Ray and Kurt Schwitters. Several of the works shown were in fact collages, but the breadth of styles and artists included reflects the wide application of the term and the sometimes fine distinction between assemblage and collage. The ‘combine paintings’ of Rauschenberg, for example, fall awkwardly between the two, being essentially planar but with often extensive protrusions of objects. The inclusion of real objects and materials both expanded the range of artistic possibilities and attempted to bridge the gap between art and life.
The ancestry of the assemblage can be traced back to the artistic and literary environment of late 19th-century France. In his later poetry, especially Un Coup de dés jamais n’abolira le hasard (1897), Stéphane Mallarmé adopted a technique in which poetic fragments were pieced together in unusual semantic and typographic arrangements. Guillaume Apollinaire later extended this method in his Calligrammes (1918). By emphasizing the visual appearance of words their traditional role of signification was both enhanced and expanded. In the same manner assemblage emphasizes the visual or tactile qualities of formerly utilitarian objects while nevertheless exploiting the perception of the banality of such objects. In the visual arts, one of the most notable early attempts to use non-artistic materials can be found in Edgar Degas’s Little Dancer Aged 14 (1880–81; bronze version, London, Tate). In an attempt to achieve greater realism, Degas included a real muslin skirt and hair ribbon in the bronze version, and the original clay and wax version also included a horse-hair wig.
“Assemblage art is non-traditional sculpture, made from re-combining found objects. Some of these objects are junk found in the streets. It is doubtful that this form of art could have existed before the 20th century. We needed copious junk to have this art form…It expresses an attitude or statement by the artists about our throwaway society…” <–KEY!
We currently live a throwaway society, where over-consumption and wastefulness is the norm. One way to curb this horrible trend is to, uh, do something about it! Captain is my attitude and statement, what’s yours?
….and that is the art lesson of the day 
When you think of found object art, what do you envision? Well from my project it might be that you visualize trash and junk, recyclables and other unwanted items being turned into something that may or may not look cool. I believe anyone can be an artist, not a potential artist but a full-fledged badass creator that can produce pieces that move people…if you create them with your heart and without profit in mind. Building the captain had transformed my project, I think that I originally wanted to link this to the cartoon and how having more shows like this around would create a new wave of eco-friendly citizens that got their foundational green loving ways from an inspiring cartoon. Captain Planet was a very inspirational cartoon and looking back, I think I can find more facets of how much it affected my life. The simple fact that love was considered an element just as important as the other tangible ones proves that they were sharing a deep deep message. It takes more than just jumping on the green bandwagon to share your love for our planet, it actually takes love. Art is a tool of love, a labor of love and a force of love when executed as such. Innovation doesn’t have to come from the most abstract thinkers but can be the genius of someone trying to show the art world that they need to remove that stick from their ass. Marcel Duchamp was one such artist. Despite being skilled in painting and other medias, Duchamp was also known for pieces that he created out of everyday objects. His Fountain piece was created from an unmodified urinal as stated above, and the piece with the wheel, yeah thats just a bicycle wheel…he knew how to work it, but one of the most intriguing things about him was that he was a rebel. He wasn’t making fun of the art world, but he was making statements and strides to loosen up the atmosphere. I don’t understand art that is boring, that takes a trained mind to understand. I want children to be able to look at what I’ve built and be interested, ask me questions and take something from the interaction. This is what activism is all about, showcasing your passion and sharing it with others. Although, I won’t get to have an exhibit featuring this piece of work, there are pictures on this blog. Outside people have seen this work, I can post pictures on any of the social networking sites that I am a part of and use the interweb to really bump up the captains street cred. Through this project I have accepted that I’m not a refined kind of person, I don’t pride myself on perfection but on the lack there of. I like rough edges, rips and tears, splotches and gaps. And everything in between. Staying within the lines makes you a minion, so I say STAND UP, SHOUT, BUILD, BREAK….do what it is that shows love and do it in your own way. I love the planet so I saved some waste and built something out of it. Lets show future generations examples that are not about more overconsumption but about sustainability, environmental justice and LOVE <3
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Artist: Marcel Duchamp (1887 – 1968)
Nationality: French
Movement: Dadaism
Media: Painting, Sculpture
Biography:
Marcel Duchamp studied in Paris, where he acquired the stimulus of Cézanne and the Fauves. He later combined the properties of Cubism and Futurism, to create a revolutionary piece entitled Nude Descending a Staircase. Duchamp was also the creator of the ready-made in 1913 , an everyday object transformed by its context. For example, in Duchamp’s 1917 piece, Fountain, he exhibited a unmodified urinal as his sculpture. In 1915, he moved to New York and became an influential figure in American Dadaism. His later works were intending to be playful and humorous, but also rebellions against the stiff nature of the art world.
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Long time no blog, sorry about that. I’ve had several rough weeks and since the passing of my grandmother last month, have been struggling to keep up with the winding chaos that is my life.
The Captain is finalized!!! Pictures to follow my ranting 
This project has worked to shape a new form of consumer in myself. Building the captain was a lot more difficult than I originally expected, the glue issues was only one of the obstacles. The last time I sat down to put on the upper body and final touches, I literally stared at this pile of junk I was creating for hours wondering what my next move would be. It’s one thing to have a vision, its another to execute it. I have many visions, many aspirations and random outlets for my creative craziness, but more often than not I don’t follow through. TIME TIME TIME, what a bitch. Always getting in the way of my fun, preventing me from truly expressing myself and limiting the things I can/want to do. But was it time that was really getting in the way? We all wish for more hours in the day, but 24 is what we have and I think we just lost a second or two thanks to some earthquake centered shifts in the earth’s crust or something…my roommate is always telling me some interesting fact about geology or war or tech stuff, he’s quite the resource. Anyhow, I’ve come to realize how horrible I am at utilizing my time. I spend more time being depressed about the stuff I need to get done than I actually spend doing the stuff that I need to get done. And playing catch up for the past few weeks has been an extremely depressing feat. However, what I lack in time management I make up for in pure awesomeness. Constructing the captain has made a new “woman” out of me. I use “woman” because gender roles are arbitrary.
My consciousness as a consumer has been altered entirely. Yes, I’m more aware of packaging in new light. Yes, I buy less. But the big YES comes from a new gained realization into how everything fits together. I’m not talking about globalization but how everything we throw away literally fits together. When I got the idea to build the captain and friends, I imagined a figure created out of aluminum cans as the only material. And with the glue issues, I quickly discovered that that was impossible. And I’m super broke again so I couldn’t afford the poxy that I needed to really get everything secure no matter what the material. I have yet to construct to rest of the crew and I’m not sure I will, I started changing my mind and wanted to build Gaia so ideas are up in the air and flowing once again.
Back to my point…
I used crushed cans and uncrushed cans for the base, but building the top half couldn’t be done with more crushed cans….so I had to look outside of that medium. And this is the mind blowing part folks, I transitioned to all of the other resources I had readily available (i.e. trash)…hence, Junk Yard Champions, yeah. So, besides the original cans, there were some bits of cardboard attached and so now I could build the torso with more cans but the arms and head was another story. So, I did what any brilliant artist does in the modern age and let go of preconceived notions of what I initially wanted and let the Cap’n do his own thing. The arms came together with bottles that I cut, and target bags I had saved for my room trashcan. I used old bath gloves to secure some hard to glue spots, I found an old mouthwash bottle and used it for the head. I took packaging from the bath gloves to make the belt and the top of the mouthwash bottle became the emblem on his chest. Voila! And he looks dope. Its a mixture of all the junk that either could or could not be recycled, some stuff we know would just get thrown into the dump with no other alternative. Well, I found another alternative dammit! And the parts fit in this magnificent way, it came out better than I imagined. When you view the pictures, think abstractly, its made in the image I drew and in the image of the actual animated character but its also a representations of how “junk” flows through our lives without us stopping to think about it. NOW I CANT STOP THINKING ABOUT IT! Everything I purchase, I look at it as a potential piece to the puzzle, admiring how I could add it here or there, or what could be made out of it. Remember, I’m not thinking of the food or products that I’m buying in the same way, nor am I considering the things they come wrapped in, in the same way. I’ve avoided some things because I know it would end up useless at the end of the cycle and I’d be a bad consumer if I let that happen.
I’m probably not going to build something out of every piece of trash I encounter, but now I know that trash is no longer just an end to a means, it can take on new form and have new life. But, going to “the” trash should always be the last place my things end up……contradicting a decluttering simplicity that I long for, which I will address in my next blog. My next few blogs, leading up to my final blog should be posted in the near future. Until next time bloggers, enjoy my boy. I think he’s so fly.
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This is going to be more difficult than I expected…..In my mind, (somethings are covered in glitter and everything taste like cheese fries) the only limit is the imagination and that’s limitless. So, when I dream up something kooky as I often do, I don’t always concentrate on the schematics of it all. If I want to do something, I try it out. It either works or it doesn’t. And if I’m super invested in the outcome, I’ll alter to get the result I’m looking for in some way or another. There have been many times when I have an epiphany and what I want to create isn’t feasible for the random fix-it-up method that I like to employ. I tried that with this project, I had an image in my head of what I wanted the end result to look like, I looked up pictures, did a sketch and then started gluing cans together. I quickly realized that cans are not as mold-able as my imagination thought they were. I had a box of cans crushed and I had to search for the right shapes, ones that were flat enough, had the correct angles for gluing more objects to it….ahhhh! This isn’t random, this isn’t something I can just glue together. It was foolish for me to think that being more calculated in my consumption choices and waste output wouldn’t also resonate in my artistic decisions. This is no longer just waste, its stuck in my house and I have to use it or recycle it. This project means I’m using it and so I have to plan, get a more clear and accessible image in my head when I approach the structure I’m building and think more about the feasibility of this image using the products I have available. Here’s what I’ve gotten so far:
The captain should be completed soon, and then onto the other characters and in the mean time I’ll be blogging about how this is all affecting me, what I’ve learned and how I can share this message. Stay tuned. Peace
Anyone can create a found object art sculpture. “Found object” = something you found, simple. Well I didn’t find the items that I’m using, I would love to create more works from found objects in the future, but for the time being we’ll stick to waste. Waste in this instance is coming from my household. I live with two other girls and one guy. So far, I have collected two bags of aluminum cans alone, they were sorted out the last two times that I made recycling runs. The last time I made a stop at Howie’s was over a week ago, and for some reason our recycling bins are not full yet. WHAT?!?! This is new, we usually fill up those suckers in five days flat. I hold the weekends accountable for our surplus of waste. We live in a spacious pad and folks like to come kick it, so we oblige. With them, they bring their beer cans and beer bottles, soda bottles, pizza boxes, wrappers of all sorts and once even a mannequin head was found in the fireplace. We kept it, named it Marge and she resides on the mantle (or occasionally in the cupboard as a nice surprise to those of us intending on getting a dinner plate).
Anyways, this project is deeply tied into a personal and spiritual stance I have towards the footprints we leave on Mother Earth. I would prefer my footprints to be decorative and vibrant, like a drag queen, only minimal and calculated. In my personal opinion, reusing waste can work to to renew experiences and perspectives. If art is a reflection of ourselves, meaning we project ourselves onto the artwork of someone else, then our interpretation of the art is based off our own lived experiences and perspectives. By creating art, you are participating in the transfer of visions, ideas, and a legacy of potential new stories to be told and shared with future generations. Through this creation, I have become closer to the objects I use.
This project has been a labor of love, it has been meditative and conducive to relaxation techniques. I have also forced more accountability onto myself when it comes to my waste habits in particular. It has helped me to rethink consumption and adjust my lifestyle with personal changes. The time and dedication that this project is taking, makes it more than a chore, it has evolved into a new way of life. Consider this: no new clothing (GASP!), reducing purchasing in general (YIKES!), reusing more, creating a budget, planning for future expenditures (WTF?!), limiting/managing impulsive buys (I can be an impulsive shopper), et cetera….
Taking these things into consideration has led to a more creative approach to how I address waste and other things that seem to have lost their value; through this new outlook or lens per se, new worth can be created for these items. Its personally revolutionary when your previous way of life is strictly cradle to the grave, it brings new meaning to “value” and getting your money’s worth.
Below are some EXTREMELY cool links that demonstrate how others around the world are reusing waste, creating art (quite officially) and taking part in a more renewable and titillating array of options when it comes to waste/recyclables. Take a peak through the ones that interest you The description of the site is below the link.
*If you can’t automatically click on the link, hit Ctrl and then click it.
Recycled Art Projects
Involving students in art is a great way to instill an awareness of how discarded items can be used again and again for many different purposes. It’s also a great way to help students realize that “new” is not necessarily “better.” We can bring beauty into our lives through art and musical instruments created from salvaged materials. It helps kids (and adults!) understand how much we throw away in the course of a day, a week, a month, and a year.
Blog: ~ S.C.R.A.P. ~ Scraps Creatively Reused and Recycled Art Projects. Scrounge art projects that reuse and recycle items into Art.
Indian art movement ‘lets’ things get reused
‘lets’ is an Indian collective art movement that seeks to reuse things that were thrown out.
It’s a physical manifestation of the adage ‘one man’s trash…’
There are some cool refurbishments.
Running the Numbers
An American Self-Portrait
Running the Numbers looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. My hope is that images representing these quantities might have a different effect than the raw numbers alone, such as we find daily in articles and books. Statistics can feel abstract and anesthetizing, making it difficult to connect with and make meaning of 3.6 million SUV sales in one year, for example, or 2.3 million Americans in prison, or 32,000 breast augmentation surgeries in the U.S. every month.
This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs. Employing themes such as the near versus the far, and the one versus the many, I hope to raise some questions about the roles and responsibilities we each play as individuals in a collective that is increasingly enormous, incomprehensible, and overwhelming.
~chris jordan, Seattle, 2008
From Waste to Art: Using and Refusing Plastic
For artist Dianna Cohen, a leftover plastic bag is a piece of her art. And now, it’s not only her canvas but her vehicle to alert the public about the dangers of the ubiquitous material in our lives–synthetic organic amporphos solids–better known as plastic.
Blog: an urban family trying to have… little eco footprints
I’m Tricia. I live on a small urban block in Newcastle (Australia). I once dreamed of living closer to nature; having space to grow food; having a teeny little ecological footprint; and being part of a community. I thought that meant leaving the city, but now I know I can try to live that dream right here. We don’t have Little eco footprints yet – but we’re having fun trying.
Hunter Waste Education Group (HWEG)
The Hunter Waste Education Group (HWEG) consists of local and state government educators from within the Hunter Region, NSW. These educators work in the environmental field, specifically in waste and sustainability education.
HWEG members work together to identify, develop and foster regional partnership project opportunities for member organisations. HWEG members also share information and resources. In this way HWEG can offer better-resourced and more regionally consistent education projects to members of the Hunter community.
A NetWaste initiative and proudly sponsored by SIMS Metal, WASTE 2 ART is a community exhibition and competition that shows creative works made from reused and recycled waste materials. The purpose of the project is to encourage the concept of REDUCE REUSE and RECYCLE whilst changing attitudes about ‘rubbish’ and what waste we all create on a daily basis.
Upcoming post will include PICTURES and more information on the progress of my project. Till then,
Peace.
I am that annoying person that keeps encouraging people to recycle…or so it seems at my workplace. I have placed high emphasis on the importance of recycling, and I have extended that message to my co-workers and my house mates. One thing that I failed to realize was how those around me would respond to this message. I envisioned overflowing recycle bins and constant trips to Howies(recycling facility in Manhattan, KS) being made to accommodate all of the waste that was being produced. I failed to realize how much waste was being disposed of by this increase in recycling. It seems that as others jump on this “GO GREEN or GO HOME” bandwagon, we forget that recycling should come as the last resort. The point of “going green” isn’t to produce more waste, especially if its just because you think you’re paying homage to the earth because some items are recyclable. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle is the order that I go by, although if you try to google it, all combinations possible show up. The image I’m trying to paint is that what we should be working for in this green movement is to reduce our output, reuse the items that we can and attempt to recycle the items that we cannot.
I am the self-imposed recycling taker-outer of my household. Each week-ish, I sort through all of our waste (I say waste because my roommates have still not learned the difference between trash and recyclables, but there are separate containers for recycling at my pad) and take what is accepted down to Howies. The four souls living in our house could probably fill one entire room of our house with things thrown out in about 3 months, top to bottom. An entire room. We are wasteful, and I think I have encouraged excess waste because instead of explaining why I recycle, I just placed some recycling bins out and told them to have at it and I would take care of the messy parts. Although, I’m the one sorting and traveling and disposing, I have been the laziest party because I failed to share what the whole point of it all was.
My project will attempt to redeem.
Pupils of the 90′s can relate to how more eco-conscience thinking was reiterated through childhood cartoons. One of the most influential shows was Captain Planet. THIS SHOW ROCKED…HARD. It had everything a little girl could want; fellow pre-pubescent youth, super powers, jewelry, Gaia, and most of all, a reason to care about the planet and it thoughtfully exhibited ways to take care of mother earth. There has yet to be a show quite like it. This show inspired me as a child and helped to lay the foundation for more conscience thinking all around.
My project will be to take the recycling from my house and turn it into sculptures of the characters from Captain Planet. WHAT?!?! I know, sounds bizarre, but this will be my way of showing how one person’s junk really can be another person’s treasure…in this instance, i’m turning the junk to treasure. I will be using mostly recyclable aluminum cans and hopefully some cardboard and I’d also like to see if I can incorporate glass and plastic. The addition of other materials will be from anything else I can find in the recycling bins that might help. I will be using a glue gun and another adhesive to seal the cans and other materials together. After the bodies have been constructed I will paint them to appear more captain-planet-character-like. This project is to show how materials can be reused and how recycling should be the last resort….reduce, reuse, recycle. I will also be doing research to find how other people around the world creatively change their junk into treasures and reusable contraptions. I will also be searching for info on how the city of Manhattan handles their trash and recycling and other aspects of waste.
I hope that I can show this finished project to someone and they get an idea of their own.
Peace.
