The Garbage Patch Design
ART PROJECT MARIA CRISTINA FINUCCI
Plastic has dominated the packaging market for the past 60 years. A garbage patch the size of central Europe – floating in the Pacific – was discovered for the first time in 1997*. Plastic packaging needs approximately 400 years to decompose. Once this packaging has entered the natural cycle of life, there’s no getting it out again. All plastic items that have been produced since plastic was invented are piling up around the world.
Globally, only around 7% of these items are recycled. We now know about five large garbage patches – two in the Pacific, two in the Atlantic and one in the Indian Ocean. Needless to say, this is a giant problem for our planet. For the past few years, we have avidly followed an art project by Maria Cristina Finucci. THE GARBAGE PATCH STATE. On 11th April in Paris, UNESCO, together with the artist,
declared the then 16,000,000 km2 garbage patch an independent state and published a declaration, in a bid to raise awareness of the plastic garbage issue. Finucci continues to speak out about the issue with regular publications and events.
www.garbagepatchstate.org
*GOOD TO KNOW: VPZ launched its first research project,
‘Alginate foam’, in 1994.
