I just finished reading BottomFeeder: How to eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood by Taras Grescoe. I fancy myself well informed when it comes to oceanic issues and the health of the world’s oceans (focusing mostly on garbage gyres). But I was blown away by how much I didn’t know about the state of the world’s fish! Environmental reporting literature usually sends me into a spiral of species-hatred (my own), depression and finally lingering guilt. However, Grescoe has accomplished what other reporters have missed, which is to leave me feeling informed and eager to try out my newly uploaded knowledge about seafood. For example, I will eat more sardines, anchovies, mackerel and smaller mid-level zone fish. I will never touch another can of tuna, unless the world governments and fishing industry make some serious changes. That is not to say that BottomFeeder isn’t a powerful book full of stories that will depress you about both fish and people. But the information is balanced out by the notion that you can immediately address your impact – become a bottom feeder.
To celebrate my newly acquired knowledge, I present to you two artists work of garbage sculptures of fish, which I found on a great site called Recycleart.org
Artists Hideaki Shibata and Kazuya Matsunaga came together in 2003 as Yodogawa Technique to create works from the rubbish and miscellaneous objects found along Osaka’s Yodogawa River. Working with discarded consumer goods and driftwood, the crafty duo made sculptural pieces that are like physical collages and that initially do not even appear as if they are made from garbage.
++ Yukari Art Contemporary
A piece of plastic scooped from the North Atlantic Ocean. It shows the tell-tale bite marks of a fish. A new study estimates how much plastic floats throughout the world’s oceans — trash that puts many marine creatures at risk.
