Page 61 - Tropic Magazine Issue 38

TROPIC • ART

Influential trashion

ARTIVISM
A new fashion exhibition at Cairns Museum
is shining the spotlight on the uncomfortable
truth of a wasteful global culture.

Beach Couture: A Haute Mess is an The same play on words has been used for She began collecting washed-up rubbish
ever-evolving collection of haute couture the name of her exhibition, ‘Haute Mess’ during her daily runs on Venice Beach
pieces made from everyday items found - or hot mess. “With my work I encourage more than a decade ago. Initially it
discarded on our beaches and streets. the viewer to question the use of single was simply an effort to keep the beach
Appearing beautiful at first, the smelly, use items and consider ways to reduce beautiful, but alarm quickly
dirty, wearable creations are designed to waste so it does not end up in our oceans set in. Her distress fuelled a desire to turn
be grotesque and confronting, forcing and landfills,” she said. “I take note of the the trash into art and draw attention to
uncomfortable viewers to take note items that are the most prevalent and try the alarming developments of collective
and act. to design a piece around that.” waste she was seeing.
The pieces have been created by an After spending the 1990s living at Marina continued her beach and street
American-born, Sydney-based ‘artivist’ Sydney’s Bondi Beach, Marina DeBris clean-ups when she moved back to
who goes by the psuedonym Marina returned to the United States where she Sydney and now spends each morning
DeBris. Say it out loud and you’ll studied graphic design at Rhode Island combing the beaches of the city’s eastern
immediately recognise it’s a mimicry of School of Design and metalsmithing at suburbs. Her works have been exhibited
the very issue she’s drawing attention to: Indiana University. in New York, Los Angeles, Tokyo and
marine debris. Sydney. This is the first time her creations
have been displayed in Cairns.
Beach Couture: A Haute Mess

Researchers at James Cook University (JCU) and the Australian Institute of CAIRNS MUSEUM
Marine Science estimate that by 2030 there will be a yearly input of between November 2022 – February 2023
20 and 53 million metric tonnes of plastic into aquatic eco-systems.
Source: JCU MORE: cairnsmuseum.org.au

61 • tropicnow.com.au