Plastikus Progressus

MEDIUMS: sculpture, touch screen, photography, sound, text, drawing, including the image & text artwork, Histories.

EXHIBITIONS:

2017 Documenta 14, Athens School of Fine Arts Gallery, 8 April - 16 July 2017.

2018 Plastikus Progressus, taxonomies and touch screen. Brewery Tap Gallery, Folkestone, UK.

2019 Plasticity of the Planet, Centrum Sztuki Współczesnej, Ujazdowski Castle Centre for    Contemporary Art, Warsaw, Poland. Plastikus Progressus. March 15 - September 22, 2019.

2019 Bonita Ely: Future Tense, Griffith University Art Museum, Brisbane. Survey exhibition.

2019 How the City Cares, Customs House, Sydney. Plastikus Progressus Taxonomies, prints and touch screen.

2020 Momento, Penrith Regional Gallery, Interior Decoration: Trench, Watchtower, Sewing Machine Gun, Tour of Duty, DUKw.  Plastikus Progressus.

Funding: Visual Arts Board, Australian Council; Arts NSW; University of New South Wales Faculty Research Grant.

The installation, 'Plastikus Progressus’ takes the form of a futuristic museum display, featuring the history of the development of the solution to the plastics pollution of the trans-ecology of water.  This futuristic narrative goes back in time from 2054, to 2017, to 1907.

In 1907,  bakelite, the first synthetic plastic was invented and pristine natural environments were common place.

2017 is represented as a key moment when plastic pollution was recognised as a major environmental disaster. Photographs document how plastic was transported into the oceans off the streets of cities.

By 2054,  genetically engineered creatures consume the plastic rubbish polluting the trans ecology of water, cleaning up our mess.  These creatures are assembled in a diorama surrounded by photographs and works on paper accompanied by a touch screen.

This narrative is embellished with scientific information about plastics pollution, the formation of gyres of concentrated rubbish, three cities’ rivers as case studies showing how our casual littering is carried from the streets & parks into the sea - Sydney’s Cooks River, Athen’s Kifossis, Ilissos and Eridanos Rivers and the Fulda River in Kassel, Germany (Athens and Kassel both hosted the international event, Documenta14 in 2017, the exhibition of Plastikus Progressus).

Taxonomies of all the genetically engineered plastic eating creatures may be viewed on a touch screen and the diorama’s labels. The taxonomies are based on the characteristics of the creatures they ‘evolved’ from, bringing people’s attention to Earth's extraordinary life forms. The creatures are constructed from discarded vacuum cleaners and rubbish off the streets of Sydney. Some are funny, some poignant, some fantastic, many have a political sub-text, for example DJ Trumpussy combining the cat, box jelly fish and the plastic eating bacteria, Ideonella sakaiensis.

The works on paper: history charts from 2000BC to 2054AD, illustrated with imagery, list the expansion & contraction of nations’ dominance - wars, defeats, invasions, colonisation, dominance - punctuated by critical inventions that changed Homo sapiens’ technological capacities,  cultures, economies, etc.

2054 PLASTIKUSPROGRESSUS : THE PROGRESS OF PLASTICS

Today, the 26th of September 2054, we celebrate the 2450th anniversary of the birth of Lao Tze, author of the international bestseller the Tao Te Ching.

In 2016, Lao Tzu inspired the use of CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) to genetically modify the “plastic-munching microbe,” Ideonella sakaiensis, improving its genetic encoding and isolating the enzymes responsible for dissolving polyethylene terephthalate, or PET.

Since then, scientists have created a diversity of creatures that digest plastics to lead our attack on plastic’s toxic pollution of water’s trans-ecology. We now depend upon these creatures in 2054 to clean up our mess in the oceans, rivers, cities and our homes:

2017 FRACTALS, LITTER & CRISPR

Lao Tzu’s conception of the numinous unity of nature and Homo sapien’s place in it is expressed scientifically in the matrix of patterns called fractals - the underlying structure of natural forms:

In the early C21st, massive amounts of plastic litter in the trans-ecology of life-giving water was an environmental disaster. Plastic’s chemical structure was antithetical to the laws of nature, having no relationship to the organic structures expressed in fractals.

Plastic killed the life forms that ingested it. Plastic also slowly disintegrated into indestructible, toxic, micro-fibres, poisoning our food chains.

Scientists have since solved this problem. They have genetically engineered creatures whose digestive systems dissolve plastics into harmless chemicals. Classified as the genus, Plastikus progressus, we give thanks to Science and the Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu’s ancient masterpiece, which inspired this brilliant solution to a seemingly impossible problem:

1907 MEMENTO MORI - PRISTINE NATURE

In 1907, when nature was relatively ‘pristine’, the first synthetic plastic, known as bakelite, was invented. This was the genesis of the scientific miracle that has delivered to us the species, Plastikus progressus -  an army of ‘environmental sanitation workers’, diligently cleaning up our pollution.

In 2017 an archive was established, recording nature in its pristine condition in three sites – the Hills of Athens, the Sababurg Forest near Kassel, and Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park, Sydney. For us in 2054 it is a momento mori of a past era’s belief in the importance of environmental heterogeneity:

THE INSTALLATION School of Art Gallery, the Athens iteration of documenta14, 2017

THE TOUCH SCREEN

TAXONOMIES

Each plastic eating creature has a taxonomy describing its classification and distinguishing features, for example, reproduction, habitat, diet, physiology.

Some examples -

CHAMPION Classification: Vacuumus champion plastikos:  Common name, Champion; Πρωταθλητής  [protathlitís] – Insect (mayfly)

Although descended from the mayfly, the Champion’s spoon-like wings achieve uplift comparable to rotorcrafts’ flight. Like helicopters, the champion’s blades rotate at speeds up to 600 rpm. Their mechanism is locked inside uniquely notched joints in a cartilage housing that resembles, in outward appearance, a Melbourne Cup trophy. Unique to Australian rivers and coastlines, this insect is believed to have evolved from tiny, plastic, souvenir replicas of the Cup, an uncanny, ‘off target’ CRISPR effect. Hence the name, ‘Champion’.

The two cups’ handle-like protrusions steer with horizontal thrust in syncopation with the force of the rotating blades’ vertical aerodynamic lift.

Champion’s sturdy physique in its mature, terrestrial stage is born aloft over rivers and streams, scouring, devouring plastic debris.  They love the plastic flowers and plants that are another ‘off target effect’ of CRISPR.

Rather than the mayfly’s primitive ancestral traits - long wings and tail inherited from the Earth’s first insects - the Champion has a unique, bushy protrusion that combines with tongs to form a very effective triangulated outreach. Hence its success as a highly efficient aquatic scavenger.

As nymphs, champions crawl from mud nests to the edge of a stream, rest in protective clusters while the moisture, strengthened with plastic microfibers, pumps through their veins to extend their rotors upwards. After just 10 to 15 minutes they are fully equipped to take off over land and sea in pursuit of plentiful, plastic nourishment.   

DJ Trumpussy: Classification: Dísk ‎arrogans conflo faeles. Common name, DJ Trumpussy; δίσκος  αναβάτης ατού γάτος  [dískos anavátis atoú gátos] - Mammal  (cat) Cubozoa (jellyfish)

This extraordinary feline is two faced - Face #1 is crowned by DJ Trumpussies’s distinctive cream coloured head cover. Like cats, they are obsessed with grooming – Trumpussy’s tongue is equipped with 500 micrometre long keratin papillae which are backwards facing and act like a hairbrush. They are known to regurgitate hairballs.

A single, bar code-like eye is located on a perfectly transparent, up-side-down container-like skull that appears to contain a vacuum. Biologists have established a genetic connection to the box jellyfish (Chironex fleckeri), which can have up to sixty tentacles, three metres in length, containing millions of nematocysts, microscopic hooks containing and delivering venom.

They do not have a brain.

Face #2 extends from its groin down to the ankle. The eyes resemble popped plastic pill containers while the nose, a bristled tooth-like structure, hovers over the characteristically cute, pursed open lips associated with the DJ Trumpussy’s permanent, smile-like facial expression. 

A bubbled cloak and serving tray protrude from the rear of the cat’s proudly upright physique. Its spine may extend and contract. Its mobility, colloquially known as the ‘hoover maneuver’, is powered by an energy efficient, 1000 watt ‘projectile mobility’ mechanism that functions as a repetitive suck up to, then discharge of the terrain it inhabits. Any plastic garbage encountered is ingested, neutralised to its chemical composition, then spat out.

Skin tone - shiny gold.

Chariot: Classification: Ecuo curruum brrrroomus.    Common name, Chariot; άλογο που άρμα [álogo pou árma]. Mammal (draft horse)

An outstanding characteristic of the Chariot is its extraordinary endurance, matched by the tenacity to gather massive loads for up to 10 hours a day. Chariot trundles over deep ocean floors, then, rising up to the surface, harvests the floating rafts of plastics in the oceans’ gyres. These traits are an outcome of selectively breeding robust, draft horses adapted to aquatic environments, then genetically combining them with enzymes and bacteria that enable unique microbes to efficiently ingest PET (polyethylene terephthalate) and PP (polypropylene).

The Champion harvests PET and PP in a cart hooked onto the back of its sturdy body. The cart doubles as its digestive system where rotating bristles churn the waste to break it down into a liquid slurry of concentrated plastic microfibers, which are then converted into harmless chemicals.

If we turn back the clock 100 years to 1954, beasts of burden, the draft horse, had largely been replaced in industrialised countries by tractors, cars, trains, trucks and military vehicles. Go back just 50 years further to 1905, the horse was the means of transport. They could haul a dead weight one tenth of their body weight – up to 180 kilos (400lbs).

In comparison, the Chariot’s loads are decidedly light weight, comprised of indestructible plastic waste. But this creature has extraordinary stamina, scouring the oceans and rivers up to ten hours a day, every day, to collect massive volumes of garbage.  Having inherited the draft horse’s healthy appetite, Chariot devours it all in a single session, helping to protect the ocean’s creatures, and our food chain also from toxic plastic.

MOTHERSHIP Classification: Maternavis : Common name, Mothership; μητρικό [mitrikó]  - Reptile (alligator). 

Scientists agree that the genetically engineered creature, Mothership, is the most experimental, if not the most successful application of CRISPR, the gene editing tool used to create this re-booted, plastic eating alligator, now adapted to fresh and saline water.

Mothership not only reproduces herself, but also provides surrogate umbilical attachments for ovocytes whose mature physical forms mirror the random plastic rubbish a Mothership ingests at the time of their conception. Conception occurs at a critical stage called estrous in Mothership’s ovulation cycle in precise confluence with her ingestion of food. Estrous triggers the fertilisation of surrogate fetuses, patterned on the object, or objects ingested.

A Mothership’s diet is exclusively plastic trapped in the trans-ecology of the planet’s water.

Mothership has 13 major umbilical stations, and can harness multiple minor staging points when required.  Her whole body is, in effect, an external uterus for essentially parasitic ovocytes.  As adults her offspring are hermaphrodites, so reproduce themselves.

Some examples:

Light Snail (Leviora cochlea) - outcome of a Mothership’s simultaneous ingestion of plastic cigarette lighters and electrical plugs.

Wag Tail (Testudo trahens) - ingestion of plastic measuring devices and a slide viewer.

Plug snapper (Obturo clostellum) - simultaneous ingestion of diverse electrical devices.

Porkupine  (Arithmetica ericius) - simultaneous ingestion of a plastic  tool for tracing circles, a plastic toothbrush, a plastic stake, a plastic plug, a power cord, a plastic bag.

Elephant tank  (Elephanti  lacus)  - ingestion of a fish tank pump and toothbrush attachment.

Black Genius Mouse Nigrum ingenium mus: Common name, Black geni mouse; ιδιοφυία μαύρος Ποντίκι [idiofyía  mávros pontíki]  -  Mammal (mouse).

White Logic Mouse Alba logicae Mus : Common name, White logi mouse, Λευκό λογική του ποντικιού [Lefkó logikí tou pontikioú] - Mammal (mouse)

Black Genius Mouse and White Logic Mouse are two of the most prolific parasitic offspring of Motherships, which is unsurprising because the mouse from which they are formed was a handy implement associated with computing found in every household and office, world wide, in the late C20th and early C21st century.

Motherships all over the world will be ingesting these mouses, or mice, on a regular basis, adding surrogate mice to the adults’ own rapid breeding.

Like the Mothership, they are highly intelligent, adaptable, physically strong and resolute in all their endeavors. Large populations of the Black Genius Mouse and White Logic Mouse have spread all over gyres in every ocean and bay. Although quite small, their large numbers are making a considerable impact on plastics pollution that accumulates where the sea currents meet and spiral inwards, sweeping plastic objects into enormous fields of junk (gyres). Black Genius Mouse and White Logic Mouse have also adapted well, almost too well, to urban habitats, adapting their natural scavenging skills to built environments. Their intelligence is considered cunning by many - the oxymoron, ‘lovable pest’, may well describe their reception inside the home where they help themselves to fresh, delicious tasting plastic packaging and synthetic objects, hiding away in well stocked cupboards, pantries and rubbish bins. They are greeted with either shrieks of shock or delight when discovered by their unwitting hosts.

PLASTIKUS PROGRESSUS DADO - along with the sounds of birds in the diorama, the dado composed of plastic waste ‘ties’ the installation together.