The Wastemakers on Cornucopia Street

Collage book series and props in The Wastemakers on Cornucopia Street

Taking its title from Vance Packard’s pioneering book ‘The Waste Makers’ from the 1960’s, which exposes the demise of the environment through the growth of disposable consumer goods, the exhibition asks us to think about themes around waste and how we might interpret, rework and re-examine them.

How do we arrive at waste? Is it matter out of place? What is the difference between dirt and waste? And what is digital waste? Searching for new perspectives on this subject brings a set of diverse artists together to discuss their work in relation to waste.

I have been working on these books for the past decade or so. Making and re-making them is a daily practice, cutting and folding in junk mail, flyers, lecture notes, stuff that gets shoved through the letter box, overwritten with spam and back-chat from internet relay channels. Here they are shown with props and weights sewn from scrap fabric dyed with food waste over lockdown.