MERMAID'S TEARS

The main part of the work is an elaborate necklace fashioned from plastic particles I have separated from the flotsam around my studio on Harakka Island outside Helsinki. The series of sieves, similar to tools used by archeologists, as well as a photo and samples of the debris are also part of the work.
Among clumps of seaweed or flotsam washed up on the shore it is common to find ‘mermaid's tears’, small plastic pellets resembling fish eggs. Plastic resin pellets have widely spread across the world’s seas. Some are the raw materials of the plastics industry spilled in transit from processing plants. Others are granules of domestic waste that have fragmented over the years. Either way, the mermaid's tears remain everywhere and are almost impossible to clean up. Whether plastics present a toxic challenge to marine life and subsequently to humans is one of the biggest challenges facing marine scientists today. Plastic is ingested by seabirds and various marine organisms, and its adverse effects on the food chain are a concern.
Installation 400 x 90 cm. Materials: A necklace made of plastic waste from the seashore, 4 sieves, 5 shelves, 1 c-print on aluminium