Sentimental Plastics is an urban design project that explores how people use plastic bags in the city environment and aims to offer creative solutions to change peoples attitudes about their own use of plastic bags. The project culminated in a live audio visual performance projecting interviews and data-mined content onto screens made from up-cycled plastic bags.
For the month of September 5th – October 7th 2007 a shipping container outside Sweet Mamas Kitchen at the Embassy end of Courtney Place in Wellington for a series of workshops and onsite activity. Sentimental Plastics generated creative solutions on how to re-purpose plastic bags to create a more sustainable future.
This project was commissioned for the month long urban design project Intenscity setup by the Wellington City Council.
According to government data, New Zealanders use 1.14 billion petroleum based plastic bags every year, which equates to almost each person using 1 bag a day. Have we have forgotten how to shop or consume sensibly? Not only are plastic shopping bags a needless use of precious fossil fuels; they end up in landfills, as litter in the environment, and they can kill wildlife when they are ingested.
They are estimated to take 500 years to break down in landfills, and even then, the micro plastic particles remain in the earth and leach out to our waterways and into the foodchain.
by Robert Appierdo and Morgan Barnard
