Trash Transformed

Have you ever heard the saying “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure”? The artists on these pages take that idea to a whole new level. With a bit of glue and some big ideas, they change the way we see common household objects, recyclables, and even garbage.

“So much about the art-making process is about paying attention,” says New York artist Tara Donovan. “It’s about looking and noticing things.” Donovan, like the other artists on these pages, works with found objects. Found objects are materials not normally used in art. Why might it be important to notice the things around you when you work with found objects?

From a distance, Donovan’s Bluffs, above, looks like an organic form, such as a coral reef or a stalagmite. But as you get closer, it becomes clear that the artist created the illusion of a naturally occurring phenomenon by gluing together thousands of manufactured plastic buttons. By juxtaposing the natural with the human-made, Donovan invites us to consider our relationship to nature.

Look closely at Tom Friedman’s sculpture on the right. The recognizable logos of brands appear in the jutting corners of the cardboard boxes he used to make it. However, from a distance, the completed form is unfamiliar. The artist juxtaposes the angular lines of the mass-produced boxes with the irregular shape of his handmade sculpture. His viewers are left to wonder about the geometric shape of the work.  

To create this piece, Friedman, who lives and works in Massachusetts, saved cardboard boxes from cereal and other products for a year. Then he cut off the corners of each box and attached them to one another. “I like the connection to everyday materials, things just sitting around the house,” says the artist.

At the world’s largest garbage dump, located in Brazil, people are paid to pull recyclables from massive heaps of trash. Brazilian artist Vik Muniz photographed several of these workers, called catadores. Then he projected their portraits onto the floor of his studio. He and a team of catadores placed trash from the dump directly onto the projection, re-creating the highlights and shadows in each portrait. Finally, he photographed the arrangements, like the one at right.

On the floor of the studio, this work was much larger than life. Notice the pair of jeans in the lower left corner. They appear to be very small and should help you understand the image’s monumental scale. 

The title of this work is Atlas (Carlão). Atlas is a mythical figure usually shown carrying the Earth on his shoulders. By forming the sphere on Carlão’s shoulders with real trash, Muniz makes a bold statement about human consumption. This project raised awareness of the working conditions at the garbage dump. How can you use art to make a statement about an issue that is important to you?