From Trash to Transformation

An artist stands next to sharks crafted from cardboard and plastic waste — Eckerd College sophomore Yarrow Bercovici-biotti used cardboard and plastic waste to craft her contribution to the *Used Once, Lasts Forever* art show. She hopes to inspire others to make their own creative expressions about the plastic crisis.
*Photo by Amanda Hagood*

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, approximately 8 million metric tons of plastic have found their way into the world’s oceans since 2010. Some of it remains in massive floating patches, such as the spectacular Great Pacific Garbage vortex. But the real extent of the problem is hard to visualize, because much of the stray plastic sinks into the water column or degrades into tiny microplastics. We now find these microplastics in fish, drinking water, and, yes, even table salt.

Artists at Eckerd College’s recent Used Once, Lasts Forever art show shared their visions of the plastic crisis earlier this month. Twenty-five 2-D, 3-D, electronic, and musical submissions spoke to — and were in many cases crafted from — single-use plastics.

A papier mache pelican with plastic waste in its hollow belly — Environmental Studies and Creative Writing Major Sara Hopkins created double-sided pelican sculpture that reveals the sad reality of plastic litter — much of which ends up consumed by wildlife.
*Photo by Amanda Hagood*

Below the Surface

Sophomore Yarrow Bercovici-biotti, majoring in Environmental Studies, used cardboard, plastic packaging, and paint to capture the sleek forms of three sharks. Her work was inspired by a recent study abroad trip she took to Honduras – where she had the opportunity to dive with these extraordinary predators – and a video she found of people crafting 3-D fish. By carefully slashing the sides of her sharks, she revealed a tangle of plastic waste inside – a reminder that that plastic problem is more than skin deep.

“I wanted to inspire others with creative ways to reuse plastics,” said Beccoulci-biotti. “And I think art makes the plastic problem accessible. It creates a larger audience.”

Sara Hopkins, a first year student in Environmental Studies and Creative Writing, agreed. Her papier-mache pelican sculpture offered two views on the iconic Florida bird. One one side, her pelican sported his elegant brown-and-white breeding plumage. But turn him around, and a recessed stomach cavity revealed a belly full of plastic waste – an all-too-unfortunate reality for many Florida seabirds.

“Maybe we don’t see the plastic,” Hopkins explained, “but it’s still there.”

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A New Tradition

This marks the second year Eckerd’s Reduce Single Use initiative, which aims to curb single-use plastics on campus, sponsored an art show. (The first exhibit took place in 2019.) This year’s show kicked off an Earth Week celebration that also included a campus clean up and a native wetland planting. At the close of the week, a plastic-free ice cream social will mark the first birthday of Remora, the campaign’s single-use plastic tracking app.

Dr. Amy Siuda, one of the two Marine Science professors leading the Reduce Single Use campaign, said they plan to make the show a yearly tradition.

“These initiatives are starting to have a real impact,” she told the assembled crowd.

“This show is witness to the fact that reuse and recycling can be implemented in practical and artistic ways,” Eckerd President Dr. Jim Annarelli agreed.

Their remarks concluded with the musical premier of “Seashells.” The duet, co-written by junior Biology and Music major Lana Guy and first-year Marine Science and Music major Taj Sorensen, featured the paired perspectives of a young child and a scientist contemplating the crisis of the world’s oceans.

A soaring, impassioned chorus powerfully rang out: “Open your eyes!”

Artist stands next to a mobile depicting turquoise jellyfish — Milena Lynch, majoring in Marine Science, used plastic bottles and a carefully applied candle to create these melty, drifty, turquoise jellyfish. Sea turtles commonly mistake plastic debris in the ocean for this favorite food.
*Photo by Amanda Hagood*

A Proof to Culture

Among the many large and impressive works hangs a delicate treasure: first year Marine Science major Milena Lynch’s “Jellies: Or So the Turtles Think.” This intricate mobile featured a dozen turquoise jellyfish. She carefully crafted them from plastic water bottles she found on campus. She shaped the bottles by melting them with a candle. Smiling, she admitted she’d had to practice a few times before getting the melt just right. She then arranged her creations to drift around one another, mimicking their natural position in the water column.

The floating sculpture dramatized sea turtles’ deadly habit of accidentally consuming drifting plastics, mistaking them for jellyfish. This dramatic presentation, Lynch said, would frame the problem in an urgent light.

“Words can only say so much, but art gives you a different way to look at it,” she said.

What’s more, she argued, referencing an idea she learned about in her Arts Activism and the Climate course this semester:

“The art we make can be a proof to culture. How else will people in the future know what we were thinking and feeling? How else will they know what was going on?”

Arts All Around!

The Gabber Newspaper covers live theater and art across South Pinellas. At times, we’ll cover things worth the drive in the Tampa Bay and Sarasota areas.