Rubbish

Axes of Waste

Sarah A. Moore “Garbage Matters: Concepts in new geographies of waste.”

Abstract: “In this article, I critically review important concepts in new geographies of waste. I focus on both the conceptual frameworks that are used to examine issues concerning waste and the political possibilities produced by understanding waste differently. By plotting a range of concepts of waste along two axes – positive versus negative definitions of waste, and dualist versus relational concepts of waste and society – I contextualize scholarship on waste within the broader discussion about the ‘rematerialization’ of geography and social science. Understanding when, how, and why waste matters provides a fruitful lens for examining contemporary sociospatial processes.”

Source: Discard Studies http://discardstudies.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/art…

Gabriel Kuri

Gabriel Kuri is currently showing with Bergen Kunsthall in Norway. The artist who often uses receipts and other waste projects and bins in his sculptural works is showing at the Bergen Public Library.

“The library system is about information and education. Libraries are meant to preserve, but also to share and make available our accumulated knowledge and common cultural heritage. As such they encompass a whole world in their collections – materialized and archived in the form of physical objects (usually books, but also documents, films, music, computer games and much more). The huge volume of information is gathered in an ever-growing accumulation that must be handled, catalogued and systematized for continued preservation in the future.”

“In Gabriel Kuri’s work, too, there is a continual cataloguing and organizing of objects and information. For Kuri, though, it is his very own, self-defined systems that underlie the juxtaposition of different objects. In one work, for example, he has sorted a large number of receipts by size into special heaps, a system that becomes absurd compared with the verifiable filing system of a bookkeeper. In another work he has organized a number of utility objects by criteria such as whether the thing is wrapped, whether it is made of wood or plastic, whether it is in one piece or put together with several pieces, etc. These ordering principles may be unconventional, but in fact make up distinct and internally coherent systems. Kuri shows how most of the things in the world are defined by context-dependent conventions of use. By loosening the frameworks around these conventions, or bringing the objects into his own self-defined systems, he puts the meaning-content of the individual objects into play in new ways.”

http://www.kunsthall.no/default_e.asp?AID=1402&ID=27&K=2&act=akt

Kuri deals with material consumption and previous works have directly referenced the waste end of the consumption cycle.

From his Solo Show at Galleria Franco Noero, Torino, in 2009:

Untitled (interval account bin), 2009

painted metal, duplicate receipts, cm 60 x 44 diam

http://www.franconoero.com/images/artisti/kuri/IntervalAccount_1MA.jpg

Untitled (segmented bin with holes in the intervals), 2009

painted metal, water, blue plastic bottles cm. 60 x 44 diam.

http://www.franconoero.com/images/artisti/kuri/segment.jpg

The distance between producer and consumer, 2008

4 black steel anti-fire trash bin, soap bits, fabric cm. 76 x 80 x 60 http://www.franconoero.com/images/artisti/kuri/kuridistance.jpg

Untitled (skip with pop corn), 2005

6 cubic metre skip, pop corn

http://www.franconoero.com/images/artisti/kuri/kuri_skip.jpg

A short video from Gabriel Kuri, Soft Information in Your Hard Facts at Museion, museo d’arte moderna e contemporanea di Bolzano

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zf2iXZ4mn7U

Gabriel Kuri is a Mexican artist (b.1970) based in Mexico City and Brussels.

Garbage as a Measure of Consumption

The Guardian reports that Alexi Savov, an assistant professor of finance at New York University’s Leonard N Stern School of Business, has used municipal solid waste (MSW), or simply garbage, as a ‘new’ measure of consumption.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/nov/05/rubbish-measure-consumption-research

In his February 2011 report Asset Pricing with Garbage, Savov makes the claim that garbage is “more volatile and more correlated with stocks than the canonical measure, National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA) consumption expenditure.”

“Virtually all forms of consumption produce waste, and they do so at the time of consumption. Rates of garbage generation should be informative about rates of consumption.”

http://www.afajof.org/afa/forthcoming/6364.pdf

Manchester Science Festival 2012: Wasted Conversation, MOSI, 30/10/12

Chaired by Prof Andy Miah with artist Gina Czarnecki and stem cell biologist Dr Rankin

The talk is illuminating. Gina talks about her interested in discarded biology in asking the question what other purpose than medical science could discarded biology be used for? Gina outlines her personal historical interest stemming from her father being in concentration camps during the holocaust and noting details of where the body parts such as fat went to.

On donor consent, Gina notes that it’s easier to obtain donations of fat than bone marrow for example.

Sarah talks about the public perception of embryonic stem cell harvesting and the recent Nobel Prize winning research of Japan based Shinya Yamanaka which has proved stem cells can be grown from skin rather than tissue specific matching. She is also very skeptical of private stem cell banks and therapy noting that private clinics offering IVF treatment often promote banking cord blood for potential future treatment whereas the NHS do not even mention such services.

On milk teeth, Sarah notes that they contain very few stem cells and Gina talks about their symbolic nature in various cultures. Anglo Saxons wore them as war necklaces. In the Uk there is the tooth fairy and France the tooth mouse. In Thai culture, milk teeth are thrown on top of the house for beauty and buried for wisdom. The is a strong connection to the afterlife in African culture.

In defining what makes the human tissue waste; Gina describes the waste from medical research that was going to be incinerated. There is also the fat from liposuction procedures that would similarly be destroyed and milk teeth that children loose. Andy also recounts a personal history of enquiring about banking cord blood and describes the lack of resource and system in place to currently enable this to happen.

The panel also touch upon belief systems and taste in the quest for human waste tissue and the difference between science ethics and ethics in art practice. As a result of this project, and encountering a gap in knowledge and procedure, Gina and Sarah have set up an Art Ethics Advisory Panel.

http://www.manchestersciencefestival.com/whatson/w…

Manchester Science Festival 2012: The Wasted Works, MOSI

Liverpool based artist Gina Czarnecki has been collaborating with stem cell biologist Dr Sarah Rankin and produced a series of works with wasted biological matter such as milk teeth, hip joints and body fat.

Recently, scientists have discovered the rich source of stem cells in discarded body parts such as bones from joint replacements, milk teeth and fat from liposuction, and are investigating how these sources of adult stem cells can be used to regenerate and repair tissues. Wasted is a collection of artworks exploring the life-giving potential of ‘discarded’ body parts and their relationship to myths, history, cutting-edge stem cell research and notions of what constitutes informed consent.

Gina has created an ice palace-like structure which she is embedding with milk teeth donated by families. The structure is made out of some kind of transparent resin material up lit with colour gels and resembles, as Gina highlighted, a Disney/fairytale aesthetic. The scale is quite small – like an architect’s model or child’s toy.

Plaster casts of jaws akin to dentists’ casts are laid out on low floor plinths and more plaster casts of hip joints are attached to a sphere above head height.

On the wall are children’s “tooth stories,” donor consent forms and correspondence from the Human Tissue Ethics Board, which we find out in the talk has proved a contentious issue: In unchartered waters, Gina seemed to not legally require ethical approval from living donors for their tissue to be used in art but institutions often do not want to get involved without ethical approval.

Spot-lit on a round floor plinth are two red chairs which are entitled Canapé (2011) made from wood, brass leather, food grade silicone and fat. Visitors are invited to sit in the fat chairs. Being nearly 6 months pregnant means I’m in a constant battle for comfort so despite the disgust factor I give the reconstituted animal in the form of furniture a go. It’s like extra firm memory foam – quite comfortable actually. When I haul myself up, the managing director hurries over and points out the split and leak on the chair I’ve sat on and apologies for lack of warning. It’s pretty disgusting. It was ok whilst concealed in opaque leather but watching the lard substance ooze out of the back is another matter.

http://www.mosi.org.uk/whats-on/the-wasted-works.a…