it’s good to talk

In my last post I wrote about what happened when I decided to make beach cleans the focus of my MA in Art and Environment. I was working on my own: cleaning beaches on my own and then working on my own in a studio trying to make art from the ocean debris I found. I was very much stuck in the idea that art is done by lonely artists who keep their work close to their chest until it gets shown in an exhibition. You know, that genius in a garrett who suffers for their art.

Chatterton by Henry Wallis, 1856. You can see this painting at the Tate Britain.

I also resisted setting up formal beach cleans because I thought art was about making, not organising, and I wanted people to think about picking up litter as something they do all the time, not just once a year. Yet, almost without knowing it, I was beginning to collaborate with others and share what I was doing. In January 2011, I performed in Watering Spirits, a shadow play devised by Emiko Tokai, which involved improvising with light and water in front of a screen in order to cast shadows that are viewed by an audience. It was both a performance and a meditative and very private experience, and it reminded me of what I already knew from years of yoga classes: that sharing a personal experience with others – in this case an audience – creates a new, and potentially more powerful, experience for all.

performing in a shadow play (photo: Emiko Tokai)

this is what the audience saw! (photo: Emiko Tokai)

I also began posting snippets from my beach cleaning on Facebook and persuading friends and family, (some a little camera-shy,) to join me, bags in hand, on the beach.

So when Jan Nowell, another MA student, suggested working together I agreed – but soon realised I felt uneasy about the whole thing. I was scared I would lose ownership of my ideas, my work. A part of me wanted to run back to my lovely studio, just me and my stuff. After a weekend of worrying, I told her my concerns. We talked it out and established some ground rules for communication: if you have a question or a concern, speak up. And if you are working on something that you feel is uniquely yours and so not to be shared, say so. Collaboration is a very productive form of working – so long as everyone is on the same page.

Turns out that Jan and I work very well together. We worked in an experimental way, a kind of learning by doing: go to a beach, clean it up, process and record the finds, make a note of what we’ve learned, repeat. We’ve cleaned beaches in Falmouth, taken the ferry to clean beaches on the Roseland, and the train to beaches on the North Coast. We began to see variations in the types of debris we found on different beaches and wondered about how much these are influenced by tides and currents. We met with people whose work overlaps with what we were doing and talked rubbish with them. Along the way we’ve met all sorts of people, and had a lot of fun: making rubbish kebabs, talking to people on the ferry, and investigating the beach using quadrats – you can read all about it in my previous posts.

Tina, Jan and Tina at Polzeath

Working with Jan made me see that I can open up my work to include others. Sometimes just a few of us working informally and spontaneously, and sometimes by inviting people to a specific event. (Yes, art can involve organising!) Working together makes the job of cleaning beaches much lighter. And the act itself becomes a space in which art occurs. It occurs in the work of transforming a beach, (however temporary that transformation may be,) and in the conversations we have had with passers-by and on the ferry. It occurs in the investigations made on beaches within quadrat squares and the unexpected participation of strangers. You can think of it as a performance, or a dance, perhaps. Not so different from performing in front of an audience in a shadow play – none of us knows quite what will happen next but the very act of working and talking together deepens the experience for all involved. In this context art is not so much about ownership, not an object you make or possess, but an action you share with others. It is a gift.

I still clean beaches on my own, especially Arthur’s Beach, my personal favourite. Sometimes I talk to people I meet and tell them what I’m doing. And the old codgers who look after Arthur’s know what I do and help out when they see me. But, to be honest, it’s Jan who has the knack for conversations. I share through this blog, and through the connections I’ve made with people all over the world who also clean beaches, and streets,  and parks. They are very special people. I’m hoping those connections will lead to more collaborations, and more art, in the future.

and do you make anything with the plastic you find?

When I tell people I’m studying for an MA in Art and Environment, they nearly always ask, “What does that mean?” Or, “What do you actually do, then?” I explain that my work is concerned with plastic ocean pollution and I clean debris off local beaches.  The response  to this information is always, “Oh, good for you” and/or “And do you make anything with the plastic you find?”

Not really, is the short answer.  But as in so much of life, the short answer doesn’t really tell the whole story …….

I started cleaning beaches because I was swimming in the sea. One day at my favourite beach I found something I couldn’t identify. It took me a while to determine that it was man-made, probably a bit of worn and battered fishing net. The dirty white ropey stuff in the bag on the left, in fact:

Soon I realised that the beach was home to all sorts of debris. My beautiful beach was a veritable dumping ground for litter and ocean debris; some left behind by the brave souls/nutters who venture so far from the public loos and cafes found at the town beaches, but even more washed in by the sea. I couldn’t just turn a blind eye, so I picked it up.

So began my career as beach cleaner. Over the past year and a bit, this career has slowly become the focus of my MA. To begin with, I didn’t really consider the cleaning to be art: art was something you made, with stuff. This point of view, however, was a tough one to reconcile with what I was doing: for one thing, the stuff I was picking up was – and still is – pretty yucky:

…… and for another it was damn lonely cleaning those beaches on my own and then sitting in my studio on my own wondering what to make of/with it all.

I tried to focus on the bright, colourful stuff that other artists find, clean and arrange into aesthetically pleasing photos or collages. For a while I even convinced myself that it was treasure, a modern version of the ancient treasure hoards geezers with metal detectors find in fields:

But when I started to incorporate the beach debris I found into my work it turned out a bit differently. Being a knitter, the first thing I made was a knitted child’s swimsuit, from a 1930′s knitting pattern. It had shells going all around it and I added beach debris on the back:

 

It had a sense of nostalgia to it because of the style, and also a sadness – the rubbish represented the metaphorical weight of the 46,000 pieces of plastic per square mile of ocean on my back as I swam in the sea, not to mention the stuff I actually pick up.

My next piece was a sun dress:

This stayed hidden away until December when I included it in a group show. It is an uncomfortable dress; it would hurt to wear. When I made it I was thinking of all the plastic that stays hidden from view but is still in the ocean even if we can’t see it. It is, as someone pointed out to me, my hair shirt.

These two pieces are a pretty good representation of my state of mind as I cleaned beaches on my own. They say a lot about how hopeless, and angry, and lonely I felt. Then in June last year I started collaborating with other artists. I’ve written in past posts about the beach cleans we’ve done and the rubbish kebabs we’ve made and, most recently, using quadrats to examine the beach more closely. These all represent a different way of looking at art. A way of seeing art as doing, not just making. Art as an act, or a performance. Changing my way of looking at art has changed how I think about what I do. I’ll write about that in my next post.

 

 

 

 

the same beach twice

Two recent visits to Arthur’s Beach: once on my own and once with my lovely sister. Both visits were blessed by unseasonably warm weather, clear skies and a calm sea. Both were for me a reminder of why I started this business of cleaning beaches in the first place – as an act of profound love for the sea in general and for this special place in particular.

The first of these two visits, I arrived just as the tide was beginning to recede. As you can see, Arthur’s is split into two by a massive rock outcrop. (The second half of the beach is only just visible behind the rock – the tide at this end of the beach reaches all the way to the cliff face.) Rather than stay in the first bay, which is where I do most of my cleaning  - my bags usually fill up before I get very far – I decided to walk along the tide line and clamber over the rock and head for the far end.

I’m glad I did. This is what I found:

Turquoise blue sea nonchalantly meeting with golden sand. Apart from the birds I could hear but not see, the beach was deserted. I stepped onto the beach feeling like the luckiest person on the planet.

This really is a beautiful beach. A place to sit and dream, perhaps, feeling the sand between one’s toes. Or to swim, naked, and feel the bite of the cold water in the sea and the benign touch of the surprisingly gentle breeze out of it. I swam first and dreamed later. Then I clambered back over the rock and picked up two bags of ocean debris from the other side of the beach.

The swimming is what drew me to this beach nearly two years ago. It is where I fell head over heels in love with the sea, and where I first discovered the ocean debris and beach litter that has become such a huge part of my life and work. I was more than happy to share this wonderful place with my sister a week later. And yes, she swam naked, too!

 

rest ye merry beach cleaners

No cleaning today, just a lovely Christmas Day walk to here:

And yes, we did find debris, including this beautifully rolled up plastic bottle:

and this pile washed up into a crevasse in the cliff:

But for the most part we walked along the rocks and admired the lichen and the starfish and the views. It is good to spend time out of doors with the people you love.

Merry Christmas.

citizen science, part 2: the plastic is always deeper in someone else’s quadrat

On a glorious late November day a group of student artists and friends got together at Gylly Beach to investigate beach rubbish and spend some time in the wonderful, if somewhat slippery, spot where place, science, environmental art  and performance meet.

A beautiful, if empty, quadrat. This and all photos for this post by Jan Nowell.

They had come because I asked them. After our last exercise with quadrats (see previous post) I wanted to see what would happen if we pushed the performative element of working on the beach. For which I needed more people, Jan to help me test a different way of making quadrats and to take photos, and something to make us stand out on the beach. I chose Hi-V vests, that ubiquitous, modern item of clothing that signals “this is serious work, people.”

When I ordered the Hi-V’s I had various designations printed on them. I’m not sure if my crew took their Hi-V’s seriously. But I do think they enjoyed wearing them, especially those with TOXIC WASTE printed on the back:

And they're all wearing red, how perfect is that?

To be honest, this time around the science was even thinner on the ground (sand?) than before. The task was to work in groups to create blocks of I metre square quadrats using string and tent pegs. We had three groups, one at each end of the beach and one in the middle, in front of the cafe. How they chose the spot for their quadrats and how they configured them, was up to each group. What they did with their quadrats once they started to look at the metre square of beach contained within them, was up to each individual. It was pretty loose because I was as interested in how the participants would react to the situation I had set up for them, as in what they would find. Their experience, as much as their findings, was the data I was after. As well as the impact we might have on other people on the beach – this was supposed to be a performance, after all.

The team at the Castle, or NE , end of the beach – Dani, Caroline and James –  chose to lay out their quadrats in a row to form a transect through the wrack line, the line of seaweed and other debris left behind on the beach by the previous high tide. James’s quadrat, which was full of seaweed, yielded 41 items, including nurdles, polystyrene fragments and a crisp packet folded and tied in a knot. Only one metre away, Caroline’s metre squared, above the high tide line, and with very little seaweed in it yielded – “NOTHING!!!” (I notice Dani chose a Hi-V with ARTIST printed on the back. Nice one, Dani.)

The red team, Arabella, Naomi, Nina and Val went down to the Swanpool, or SW, end of the beach and also chose to lay out their quadrats in a row to form a “cross-section up the beach” with differing amount of weed.

In spite of digging deep this group did not find as much rubbish as they had expected, only a few items in each quadrat. A result that surprised and perplexed them – should they be disappointed or pleased that they didn’t find as much as they had hoped for? Most of the rubbish that ended up in their quadrats (you can see some of it at the bottom of the above photo) was provided by Bruno, released from the tedium of school by the public workers’ strike and on the beach with his grandparents. Bruno was tireless in his efforts and happy to talk about his work.

Is it plastic or is it seaweed?

Bruno also earned a Hi-V vest, with MAINTENANCE printed on the back. Appropriate for someone who worked so hard to clean the beach for us and who already sorts out his grandma’s recycling. His grandparents were delighted that he had the opportunity to join us. We were delighted to have him join our team.

The red team also attracted the attention of some dog walkers, who were shocked to learn about plastic ocean pollution. One lady was very concerned by the TOXIC WASTE Hi-V’s and wondered was it safe to walk on the beach? The next day I learned that she had asked the same of one of the regular morning swimmers. I have mixed feelings about this reaction. I deliberately chose the words TOXIC WASTE to shock people into thinking about the toxic nature of plastic pollution. But I don’t want to get people down about it. It’s difficult to feel you can do anything about a problem if it feels overwhelming. Perhaps CLEANER BEACH might be a more positive message, one that allows for action?

In the middle of the beach, and right below the cafe, Katy drew the short straw. Her team was supposed to also consist of me and Jan. But Jan was busy recording GPS readings and taking photos. And I was busy running up and down the beach making sure everyone was working hard, I mean happy. Undeterred by the rest of her crew spending as much time elsewhere as with her, Katy made up four quadrats arranged with two below the high tide line, one at, and one above,the wrack line.

I took the high quadrat and found one piece of cloth. Katy took the other three. In common with a lot of the group, Katy found the quadrat a “great way of placing yourself, making yourself look deeper and more carefully.” Most of the rubbish she found was on the surface at and above the wrack line. Below high tide she had to dig to find four pieces of worn glass. Thankfully Katy’s daughter Lily and mother Teresa arrived to help, and soon we had roped in our youngest, and smallest, team member yet:

Once Katy had her quadrats wrapped up, the whole family decided to clean up the rubbish outside the quadrats. (Teresa is a nurse and she identified a surgical instrument. Thankfully no needle involved, but how on earth did something like that end up on the beach?) The others had the same idea – James and Jan ended their time on the beach by walking the length of the wrack line and cleaning up: a better use of time than staring into, and methodically sorting through, a metre square?

James and Jan taking care of the rest of the beach. (Obviously, I took this one!)

Back at the cafe we evaluated the morning’s work and warmed up:

I am happy to report that a jolly time had been had by all. Everybody enjoyed being out on the beach on such a wonderful morning. Words such as harmonious and meditative were used to describe the experience. As in our previous outing, using the quadrat had proven to be both a useful discipline and a source of frustration: too small  a means of investigating an issue as huge as ocean pollution. And while the group felt there was value in collaboration, and we had made an impact on the other people on the beach, the consensus was that there was no scientific value in this exercise at all!

Turns out quite a few of the team had way more knowledge and experience of science than I do. They did agree, however, that using the quadrats, even in a manner that was not scientifically valid, was useful in training the eye to look. A skill both scientists and artists do well to cultivate.

(Many thanks to the crew, their family members and Bruno for all their hard work. Thanks also to Tina who came for a while to film our work, to Daro for joining his students on the beach, and to those members of the public who talked to us and offered to help. And many thanks also to all the staff at hivisworkwear.net for printing and sending the Hi-V vests so promptly.)

citizen science

James and a quadrat, Gylly Beach

There’s a strand of thought in environmental art that suggests that artists behave more like scientists: that art, like science, should be about research, data collection, and generally working to develop, support or refute theories. I’m not sure where I stand on this. On the one hand I love that scientific knowledge can enhance our experience of natural wonders, such as the thrill that comes from knowing that when we see stars we are looking back in time. I also suspect that a lot of science happens because scientists, like artists, retain that sense of wonder and imagination we all have as children, and that generally gets dulled by the experience of growing up going to school. Think of Einstein. On the other hand, art is not science.

It is true that artists research and experiment with methods and materials, so as to build up a knowledge base and expertise. However, I think art works on many levels and the experience of art will be different for different people because the way it taps into our individual emotions and memories as well as our sense of cultural belonging. You can’t describe how art works in quite the same way as, say, electricity. But we live in challenging times, both politically and environmentally. If as artists we can use our work to help create a new way of living on this planet, then it can’t hurt to borrow a few tricks from scientists – incorporate science into artistic practice if you like – and see what happens. Call it an experiment in cross-disciplinary action.

Which is why, when I said I would organise an activity based on my practice for my MA group, I decided to use quadrats on the beach. Quadrats are one meter squares, usually made of tubing, used by biologists to measure bio-diversity. You place your quadrat on the ground and count all the plants, bugs, etc you find within it. Placing several quadrats randomly over the area in question, (a meadow, perhaps,) will give you a pretty good idea of what’s there without having to count every living thing. It will also show patterns – does one creature hang out in one area, and not in another, for example. And it can be replicated in different places or at different times of the year.

Five of us tried it on a sunny afternoon during half-term after a week of high tides and strong winds from offshore. Gylly Beach, the main tourist beach in town, was covered in huge piles of lovely thick seaweed at and below the high tide line. I had to improvise, so we used quadrats I had made the night before: some out of bamboo poles and others of string.  I gave my classmates/guinea pigs basic instructions on what to do and then left them to choose where to go. James, who you saw at the top of the page, and Pete went below the high tide line. Pete decided to place his quadrat right in all the seaweed:

He found one cigarette butt and bit of plastic wrapping and then decided to create a sculpture in his empty quadrat. James, who dug down an inch before the tide came in, found some well-worn fragments of glass, with the larger pieces lower down. Both were disappointed they didn’t find any of the “promised” plastic rubbish I’ve been banging on about all year.

They should have been at the back of the beach with me, Jan and Dani. Jan, who admittedly is practically a professional beach cleaner, (together we have removed thousands of items of rubbish from local beaches,) found 163 pieces of rubbish in her metre sqaured.

127 of these were pieces of polystyrene. She also found 27 nurdles. Dani’s first quadrat yielded only one piece of glass:

She then moved a few yards and set up shop again, this time finding an assortment of rubbish including 9 cigarette butts, 36 pieces of polystyrene, and 86 nurdles. This find warranted a “woah!” on her sampling sheet. Quite so.

I didn’t finish my quadrat, which was also at the back of the beach right at one of the access points, but I collected 120 pieces of litter including 4 cigarette butts, 58 pieces of polystyrene, and 41 nurdles.

So what did we find out? That glass gets buried into the sand below the tide line but nurdles don’t. That when you’ve had heavy tides you might not find much plastic below the tide line – the sea has taken it all away. That there is more rubbish at the back of the beach and the most common items on this beach are cigarette butts, bits of polystyrene and plastic nurdles. And that even within this finding there will be patches at the back of the beach with lots of rubbish and others with very little: In conclusion, if you’re walking along the edge of the sea on a beach this winter and see is what appears to be a pristine beach, you’re not getting the whole picture.

I already knew this: I can tell you that in my experience I tend to find polystyrene and nurdles at the back of the beach and that they collect in patches where, I presume, the wind has blown them (the polystyrene) or the tide has deposited them (the nurdles.) But until now I had I no factual evidence for that assertion: My work cleaning beaches creates data because I collate all the material I pick up once I get it home. But the interpretation is limited: everything I find gets thrown into my bags and mixed up, regardless of where it came from on the beach. So using quadrats gives a more accurate picture and this can only improve upon repeating the exercise.

But how significant is that data? As interesting as it is – and as useful as it is for showing people just how much litter gets washed up on our beaches – for me the art in my work happens in the act of cleaning the beach itself, on my own or with others, and in the encounters I have with people on the beach and the coastal path or the reactions to this blog. Think of it as a sort of street theatre but on the beach or in cyberspace.

So for me, the most interesting data came from the observations made by James, Pete, Dani and Jan as they cleaned their patches of beach, and later recorded on the sampling sheets I gave them to fill in. First of all, they all complained that the quadrats I gave them didn’t stay in one place. So I definitely need to improve upon the design – and maybe supply scissors to cut the seaweed. Jan and Dani expressed their frustration in comments such as:  ”Quadrats are a great way to quantify the collections but I found myself noticing the plastic outside the quadrat and getting annoyed I couldn’t pick it up” (Dani.) Or, “Using a quadrat is very frustrating because you feel the pressure of the square and also you see all the rubbish outside the quadrat.” (Jan.)

In the end Dani began to clean the beach proper rather than start a third quadrat. Personally I loved my quadrat and had no trouble ignoring all the rubbish outside it. I know that if I ever go back there will always be plenty for me to pick up.

beautiful seaweed - shame about the nurdle

James gave a great description of what he did and revealed disappointment: “After finding a small amount of glass on the surface of the beach I then took an inch off the top layer of sand – this revealed a lot more glass of larger sizes. I was hoping for buried nurdles.” Pete asked a pertinent question: “was it a performance or a scientific data gathering exercise/process? ….. in the end just wasn’t sure what you wanted me to do and made a sculpture using canes, sand, seaweed etc, which was ‘nice’ – but not what I think you wanted”

Actually, Pete, it was exactly what I wanted! This was an experiment, after all. I wanted to try something different from just cleaning the beach. I wanted to see what would happen if I introduced a scientific method into my practice. But because I am stubborn and do not like to be told what to do, I wanted to leave the exercise open-ended, and to give the participants enough room to do what they felt like, wether it be dig for glass or clean outside the quadrat or make a sculpture with sand and seaweed.

My only disappointment for the exercise was the non-existent reaction from other people on the beach. Everyone reported a distinct lack of interest – I even had one swimmer run right through one corner of my quadrat and not notice. Yes we may have garnered some data but I want to create art, as well! So for the next time, I think we do indeed need to make it more of a performance. Should be fun.

curiouser and curiouser

Delve into the world of litter and rubbish – on and off the beach – and you soon find yourself in a strange, parallel world occupied by unknown people who leave curious reminders of their presence.

We all recycle. And some of us religiously rinse and squash flat any plastic bottles we throw into the recycling bin. Likewise, on the beach, we regularly find empty bottles squashed flat, concertina style:

This involves removing the bottle top, squashing the bottle and then replacing the top, so the bottle stays squashed. After all that work, the person who did this then opted to simply leave their bottle behind!

 

 

More apparently pointless effort is revealed by this carefully folded and knotted wrapper:

And here’s another one I found around the corner from my home:

Others take a little more care to show off their handiwork when leaving things behind. This wall in Falmouth has a fine collection of cans and crisp packets stuffed into it:

Back to the beach, here is a pile of rubbish carefully left in a depression by the side of a path:

This is in quite an out of the way spot. Maybe whoever left it behind thought nobody would notice.  Whereas the person who left the following offending article really has no shame at all at leaving their, or I should say their dog’s, crap behind:

I found this just on the town beach, just three days after dogs were allowed back on the beach after the end of the summer season. Note the dog poo bin, helpfully provided by the council, just eleven paces away!