You Made that with Plastic?

For an exhibit at the Gualala Art Center, Mirka Knaster, with co-curator Paula Haymond, asked the timely question, You Made that with Plastic?  Eighteen fine artists with thoughtful responses, answered with expert artistry and doses of good humor. 

Our beach plastic ATV made the trek with us as we drove HWY 1 winding through Bodega Bay, Jenner, Fort Ross, Timbercove, Sea Ranch then on up to Gualala. Spectacular ocean views, abundant wildflowers, and the companionable enjoyment of each other's company made for a perfect day trip getaway.

We were invited to bring our black plastic to do a reprise of RIDE-ON  our successful pile-up at 120710 in Berkeley. But not wanting to repeat ourselves plus knowing that each venue offers a new way to display, we wanted to do it differently.

Thanks to Artforum (January 2024), we found the answer. 

How could it be that we had never heard of esteemed conceptual artist Bernar Venet whose work built on the legacies of Dada, Fluxus, and Minimalism? His first sculptural work, Pile of Coal (1963) expressed the force of gravity when the material, dumped into a heap, took its form. This performative gesture was his embrace of “randomness, disorder, and unpredictability.”

When we caught sight of the photo of Venet unloading his dump truck of coal, something clicked, a light went on, and the idea of our black plastic being enacted as a performative event would offer a different way of turning our trash into treasure and, in this case, with a bow to the historical antecedents of piles — Smithson, Vautier, Kaprow. 

Mirka agreed to dump our bins, letting the plastic fall where it may. HUZZAH, we were so happy!!! as we watched the plastic tumble into place. Our ATV vehicle was placed on top of that pile. 

Our piece, now named PILE IT ON, is literally and figuratively, in the center of the gallery, and is the center piece of the show.

You Made that with Plastic?

About the necklaces, Judith writes:

Each piece of plastic used in the creation of this jewelry was collected from a 1,000-yard stretch of Kehoe Beach in the Point Reyes National Seashore. The brightly colored bits are "curated" from the confetti strew that washes up onto the beach. In my studio, they are cleaned, sorted into color and kind then become my "inventory." Sometimes an unusual shape will spark a design reverie. Sometimes the rich surface, the sea-buffeted patina will incite the creative process. Sometimes the recognizable part of something (a piece of a comb or a juice lid) will evoke the question — could that have once been mine?

Wearing one of my eye-catching pieces always attracts much attention and is a perfect segue to talk about problems with plastic in our oceans and on our beaches. Although the news about plastic pollution is dire, by putting a little fun and fashion into the conservation conversation, I hope that the value of the plastic detritus will increase so that soon everyone will be out at the beach “shopping” for a special piece of plastic trash or will be eager to “mine” the North Pacific Gyre for plastic treasures. Then, we get some great things to wear and to look at, plus we get a clean and healthy sea.

After years of collecting plastic, I craft my choicest finds into unique art-to-wear pieces —hand-crafted, one-of-a-kind, made exclusively from Kehoe Beach plastic. They can be worn or displayed as a precious artifact, a relic of contemporary consumer culture.

                                                        Widening Gyre

                                                                                            Pacifier Two 

You Made that with Plastic?

About the bracelets, Judith writes:

When opening their milk carton in the morning most people don’t even notice the plastic pull-tab. It’s so small, it's nigh invisible. Milk used to come in clear glass bottles delivered on one's doorstep. Years later, at the store, milk was bought in a boxy wax carton with a fold-open spout. Now, in the name of sanitation and convenience, milk cartons have been “improved” with plastic safety pull-tabs. Now, thousands of these ubiquitous tabs are making their way to the landfill and some times end up on the beach.

To draw attention to this blight, I made a bracelet by looping one loop inside the other and on around until the final one loops into the first one. People always take note of my unique jewelry, which gives me the opportunity to talk about plastic and to encourage action about everything, even about milk cartons. 

You Made that with Plastic?

The artists, the artworks, and the enthusiastic crowd made for an exciting opening reception. You made that with plastic? sparked talk aplenty and many more questions. 

 

We hope that gallery visitors will think about our pile of black beach plastic — what we, just two people, collected from just 1,000 yards of one beach, Kehoe Beach in the Point Reyes National Seashore. That they will take a close look and hopefully, discover in the mess of shards and fragments, recognizable objects and ask themselves, could that comb have once been mine? and ponder — what can we do with the wreck of our petroleum-based consumer culture? 

Extraordinary Art Experiences in America

Kudos to Rebecca Hoffberger who put "visionary" in the lexicon and on the map. We are thrilled to see AVAM featured in this compendium of must-see art venues. And are so happy that our installation in the entry corridor is included in the article.

KNOTS AND NOT

Our friend, an experienced mariner, has survived hazardous conditions in the frigid Alaskan waters while working as a commercial fisherman on large factory ships and he knows knots. As he says, tying a fishing knot is an important and essential skill of fishing as well as knowing which knot to use when.

Over the years we have collected hundreds of 2-3“ cut pieces of rope from Kehoe Beach. They have always been a curious find. We had no idea of where or why until recently when talking with our friend who immediately identified them as scraps cut from tying and repairing fishing nets. We are grateful for his information about this mysterious bit of plastic pollution.

Although there are stiff Coast Guard* penalties for allowing anything plastic to go overboard…all too often, these seemingly inconsequential pieces are swept or inadvertently blown out to sea.

Each piece may be small, but they do add up.

*The U.S. Coast Guard regulations prohibit dumping of plastic refuse, and garbage mixed with plastic, into any waters. These restrictions apply to all U.S. watercraft where ever they operate. Violations may result in civil penalties up to $25,000, a fine up to $50,000 and/or a prison sentence of up to 5 years! 

Seafoam

"Ski Week”, in colloquial terms is the mid-winter school break, the week after Presidents' Day. Some say the moniker is elitist because the costs for many are prohibitive. Although it is the prime time for snow and going to the mountains, our grandkids, Clementine and Aloysius, discovered that Kehoe Beach was the place to be. The crashing waves of the recent storms along with dissolved organic matter created great puffs of foam. So instead of snow drifts there was abundant seafoam. "Ski Week" is now "Seafoam Week." Plus, with rain still threatening, there were no crowds. The expanse of the ocean and beach was all ours.

Spotlight

Judith writes: 

This feature story came as a total surprise!!! Arriving on my computer with a flash. 

I've have worked with Tricia Watts from ecoartspace on several projects, 

but had no idea she was shining this spotlight. We go way back to the Waterlilies (2009) 

floating on the pond at the Marin French Cheese Factory.

Many thanks to Tricia and ecoartspace for all that they do to support the arts, 
bringing together artists, scientists, professionals, students and advocates, 
sharing resources and each other's work. To join HERE.

Member Spotlight l Judith Selby Lang

Monday, February 19, 2024 10:39 AMAnonymous

MEMBER SPOTLIGHT

February 19, 2023

This week we recognize  Judith Selby Lang, and her works made since 1999

in collaboration with her partner Richard Lang, working with plastic 

debris collected along the Point Reyes National Seashore in Northern 

California.

Unaccountable Proclivities, 2001 (above), combines the colors of the 

ocean plastic that mimics and compliments Fiesta®Ware plates. 

It was an unaccountable proclivity that moved them to create these 

arrangements. By carefully collecting and "curating" the bits of plastic, 

they fashion them into works of art that matter-of-factually show, 

with minimal artifice, the material as it is. The viewer is often 

surprised that this colorful stuff is the thermoplastic junk 

of our throwaway culture. As they deepened their practice they found, 

like archeologists, that each bit of what they find opens 

into a pinpoint look at the whole of human culture. 

Each bit has a story to tell.

 click images for more info

Unintended Consequences (above) was a series of photographs presented

at the U.S. Art in Embassies, Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia,                

September 2010 - June 2012, organized by the US Art in Embassies program    

and was a collaboration between Ambassador John Bass and                  

Assistant Curator Claire D'Alba.

for here or to go?, 2021 (above) was a large scale installation 

presented at Lands End, at the former Cliff House, San Francisco, 

a project of the FOR-SITE Foundation. In the kitchen, the steam tables 

were filled with white plastic and white ceramic plates were piled 

with white beach plastic. All of the plastic dished up was found only 

on 1000 yards of Kehoe Beach in the Point Reyes National Seashore. 

It wasn’t left by negligent picnickers. Most of it has been at sea 

a long time before washing ashore. When the common use of plastic 

found its way into our lives during WWII, plastic was touted 

as an exciting new material that would revolutionize and indeed, 

it has provided new hips and knees, allowing for unbelievable 

medical advances. But we’ve been inundated with “convenience” 

and a throw-away ethos. In the swirl of debris, from food shopping 

to consumer goods, plastic is the unseen background of daily living. 

Besides the blight of plastic itself, a mad scientist's brew of toxic 

chemicals is leaching into our bodies. We have learned that every human 

being has traces of plastic polymers in their bloodstream. 

That’s the bad news we live with these days. 

There really is no choice when asked,"for here or to go?"

Ride-On, 2024 (above) featuring all-black plastic and a toy ATV, 
was exhibited recently in the exhibition “Far away is NOW” at 120710 
gallery in Berkeley. "It is a complex reminder of our actions and their 
consequences on our environment,” says Francis Baker, the exhibit’s curator. 
“Another revelation occurs when one realizes that this is just the 
all-black plastic. The artists are using this to symbolize oil. 
It also amazes me to think about how much plastic there is that washes up, 
that they collect, for them to have a pile this big of fully black pieces. 
This makes me realize what we as a society are doing to our environment.”

all of it (well, alot of it anyway), 2023 (below) was presented by FOR-SITE’s                                   The Guardhouse project at Fort Mason, San Francisco, California, Summer 2023.                                After nearly a quarter century of collaboration the Lang's excavated their                                    two-ton collection of beach-found plastic objects to showcase a sampling of                                    “all of it” so they might see our consumer choices reflected in their materials. 

This assorted thermoplastic junk-treasure dating back to as early as 1948 washed 
in from the Pacific Ocean onto one beach, a .6-mile stretch of the Point Reyes 
National Seashore, 50 miles north of San Francisco. The installation confronted 
the artists with evidence of this material continuing to amass not just in 
coastal deposits, but inside our bodies, and in the geological record of our 
time on planet earth. "all of it" was presented in partnership with Fort Mason 
Center for Arts & Culture.

Judith Selby Lang, along with her partner Richard Lang, have rambled 1000 meters
of tide line on Kehoe Beach, Point Reyes National Seashore in Northern California,
 to gather plastic debris washing out of the Pacific Ocean and have collected 
over two tons of material. Their artwork has been featured in over seventy exhibitions 
in galleries and museums; educational and science centers including the 
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Artist Windows, the United Nations World 
Environment Day, the Cummings Gallery at Stanford University, and the University 
of San Francisco. Exhibition venues include the California Academy of Sciences, 
Sausalito's Marine Mammal Center, The Oakland Museum, Hong Kong's Ocean Film Festival. 
They were cited as co-authors in a report from the University of Tokyo about 
concentrations of pollutants in plastic pellets published in the 
2009 Marine Pollution Bulletin. TV segments have included appearances 
on the PBS Newshour, The Travel Channel, Wowow Tokyo and The Today Show. 
In talks about the project they have appeared at the Newseum in Washington, DC, 
The Dallas Art Museum, California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, 
Oakland Museum, Oxbow School in Napa, CA, and California College of the Arts 
in SF. Their projects have been supported by the Feigenbaum Nii Foundation, 
the Arts and Healing Network and the Open Circle Foundation. Plastic Forever- 
Finding Meaning in the Mess is the working title for their forthcoming book 
about their art and plastic adventures. www.beachplastic.com

Featured images (top to bottom): ©Judith Selby Lang with Richard Lang, Unaccountable Proclivities, 2001; 
Unintended Consequences, photography exhibition at the U.S. Art in Embassies, Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia, 
September 2010 - June 2012; or here or to go? at Lands End at the former Cliff House, San Francisco, California, 
a FOR-SITE Foundation project, 11/07/21- 3/27/22; Ride-On, 2024, at 120710 gallery, Berkeley, California, 
January 2024; “all of it (well, alot of it anyway)” for FOR-SITE’s The Guardhouse project at Fort Mason, 
San Francisco, June 24 - August 31, 2023; portrait of the artists.

ecoartspace, LLC Mailing address: PO Box 5211 Santa Fe, New Mexico 87502

Rain or Shine

Rain or shine; shine or rain; in anticipation of the closing event Saturday, January 13 for Far Away is NOW… we were checking the weather report every day. With the sun being the important partner for a sun-print workshop we were afraid that we would not be able to offer the opportunity to create lumen prints and cyan-lumen prints.

Thanks to our colleagues Ron Moultrie Saunders and Francis Baker, an indoor darkroom with UV lights and cardboard boxes was set up and outside tables were ready-set for the sun. We added our beach plastic to the pile of plastic that Francis had prepared and we were ready for action. And there was action aplenty as folks experimented with the placement of the shapes and the length of the exposure.

It was our good luck that the day brought both rain and shine (well, not exactly shine but overcast with enough light to expose the prints). Francis explains the process.

Ron invited folks to try his technique of water on paper.

The results were amazing  — drum roll please — with lots of oohs and ahhs as the process developed.

Look at Sharon McDonnell's artful arrangements and the prints with subtle shapes and the beautiful blush of lavender. 

We were thrilled that even with the inclement weather, lots of folks turned out. They braved the storm and braved the address that is one and the same as the gallery name 120710.art

Thanks to Colleen Bidwell from the Marin IJ. Her article From mess to meaning helped to get the word out in a grand way, in print and online, with eye-catching photos, 84 pt. headline!!! and many column inches. 

That said, No rain is gonna fall on our parade.