Distorted Depths

This body of work uses human fascination with deep sea creatures to raise awareness about the growing quantity of plastic pollution in our oceans, and how single-use plastic in food packaging is contributing to it.  These cyanotypes are contact prints produced by placing small sculptures made from recycled plastic food packaging and hardened embroidery on fabric coated with light-sensitive chemicals. By using discarded plastic sourced from my own household to actually create the images of sea creatures, this project builds a stronger visual and emotional connection between the problem of microplastic pollution in our oceans and the animals that are being most affected by it. The process of collecting plastic as material for this project, rather than immediately recycling it, also made me much more aware of the amount of plastic waste produced in the course of my life.  Since beginning this work I have been conscious of my plastic consumption, but I have also realized how difficult it is to avoid this kind of food packaging all together and that systemic changes are necessary to reduce the amount of plastic wasted to provide people with food that they need.