Giant lobster, made largely from rubber strips used in lobster pots, by Piers Lockwood
Balloons blow. Don't let them go...
Exhibition at the ESI in Penryn
Plastic fragment polar bear by Liz Franklin
Giant shell carved from a polystyrene pontoon float by Liz Franklin
Strings of shotgun wadding, much of it probably having arrived here from Canada
Old Man of the Sea rope head sculpture by Audrey Ryder
Discarded knots of synthetic rope. Couldn't they have been disposed of on shore instead?
Lighters picked up in just one month from Tregantle
All Washed Up
This three-day summer exhibition, held in Kingsand in July 2013, marked the start of our efforts to raise greater awareness about the marine plastic crisis through art.
Some 14 local artists contributed work to the show, which was a huge success, attracting hundreds of visitors.
The fact that the pieces were so varied – some beautiful, some deliberately ugly, ranging from photography and tiny, delicate crocheted strands of rope to an apocalyptic 3-metre lobster made from lobster pot rubber and other industrial-type marine waste – enabled them to convey the enormity of the marine litter issue and its many sources.
Most of the pieces in this show then spent the next 18 months touring various venues in the South West, including the National Marine Aquarium in Plymouth, the University of Exeter’s Environment and Sustainability Institute, the Marlisco/ Dirty Beach exhibition at Mt Edgcumbe, Living Seas in Torquay and Torpoint Community College.
Most of the pieces exhibited at the show were auctioned at our AGM in late 2014. We are now planning to hold a bigger and better marine plastic art show, again at the Kingsand Community Hall, in late July 2018.