My Beautiful Garbage
2008
Based on the principle of organising as a means of beautifying, I
utilise colour as a practical system of categorisation, to positively
alter our perception of garbage. By definition refuse is deemed
unappealing, and subsequently ugly. Through the categorisation of
refuse by colour, the large sum of the constituent items magnifies its
visual presence, creating a striking mass of waste, highlighting the
potential beauty of garbage. Each colour category can be seen as a
loose definition of itself, its tone representative of a period of time
and the individual’s consumption habits, the tone of orange one week
differing to the next for example.
Colour sorted refuse feeds directly into the next part of the system,
which deals with the issues of scale concerned with garbage. Upon
collection, colour categorised garbage is moulded into tiles which
can be stacked to construct a new form of landscape. Rather than
covering or burying, garbage as a material comes centre stage,
creating a new landscape aesthetic. Synthetic beauty contrasts with
natural beauty, thus questioning man’s idea of nature.
Landscape Garbaging uses scale to visually represent our
consumption habits, in essence, the bigger the garden the more
waste you’ve produced. There is no more ‘out of sight, out of mind’.
Each tile represents 1 moulding, the layers of tiles signifying the
passing of time and objects during our lives. As such, tiles can be
continually added, the landscape constantly evolving. By creating
a landscape, garbage is placed in a void where it becomes semifunctional,
lying somewhere between refusal and acceptance. In this
way the phrase, ‘what’s garbage to one is gold to another’ no longer
applies.