‘The Ghost Ship’
Made with recycled materials: wire mesh, clothing fabric, sail cloth, ghost fishing net, steel rod offcuts, and mirrors. Also including driftwood, acrylic paint, and thin steel wire.
1.5m x 1m, 2021
This piece was made during the five-day residency known as CQ Shopfront alongside artists Jeanette Stok, Patricia Coleman, and Melissa Peacock, and hosted by The Ideas Distillery, Photopia Studio, and Crow Street Creative.
The use of recycled materials in this project is a direct comment on the global need for improved waste management systems and modified production and consumer behaviour. This passion for sustainability grew throughout my time working as a professional diver across several countries whose societies lacked the infrastructure to deal with waste. As a result, I spent time living on plastic ‘paradise’ coastlines and diving on reefs which, in only a matter of weeks, I watched become riddled with disease.
Creating artwork with recycled and natural materials has therefore become very important to me, and I was determined in this project to make something out of whatever I already had lying around. As I worked, I was reminded of the adventures over the years that the patterned fabrics had appeared in and the people who had given me their clothes when they were no longer needed.
All in all, the work cost less than $10 to produce.