One of our talented artists, Sophie took on the task of replicating such an important and groundbreaking campaign supporting The Sea Shepherds most recent project with FF New York, Plastic Ocean.
The Plastic Ocean project’s mission has been drawing vital awareness into the devastating plastic pollution of our oceans. In the past year over one million ocean animals have died due to excessive plastic debris. It has been said that “If we don’t stop it’s progress, soon the oceans will contain more plastic by sheer weight than all animal life combined” …
We were initially drawn towards the campaign due to the colourful and dreamlike art work. It so eerily replicates the haunting experience sea creatures have experienced due to our excessive use of single use plastic.
“The pollution of the oceans reaches new records every year with patches of plastic debris in the size of entire countries…”
We spoke to our artist Sophie about what it was like replicating something so important to the future of our planet.
What initially inspired you to create this piece?
“So I initially saw the campaign on Instagram, created by the amazing organisation Sea Shepherd who have been working hard towards raising awareness of protecting our oceans and sea creatures from excessive plastic debris. I was drawn in by the bright shiny pink and purple colours until I realised what the video was actually demonstrating. I thought they created a very strong visual representation of a powerful topic and I wanted to try to .”
Did you find the process challenging?
“Yeah, it was quite challenging actually, obviously a lot of what we do is large scale murals so working on a small canvas in spray paint is tricky in general due to the nature of spray paint. Working on a small scale tends to be harder, however it was great to be challenged on a scale I don’t usually paint in.”
Did the campaign behind your artwork inspire you to want to make changes to your daily plastic usage?
Yes actually, I think it is so important to be aware of your amount of plastic usage in your daily life, to protect the oceans and to protect the environment generally. I like creating pieces that support important organisations like this, it’s important to make sure you do your bit.
POSITIVE CHANGE
Already we can see a positive shift in attitude and physical change as the UK’s Environment Secretary Michael Gove recently announced his intentions to BAN plastic straws throughout the UK. One single plastic straw takes over 500 years to break down and over 500 million straws are used and thrown away on a daily basis…
