It’s hard to get your head around, but there’s currently around 150 million tons of plastic in our oceans, that’s being added to drastically year on year. It’s a frightening thought that has prompted an architecture and design firm to create a giant whale out of reclaimed plastic, to emphasise the fact we need to act now.
There are several huge ‘garbage patches’ in the seas and oceans with one between the coast of California and the Island of Hawaii being measured at bigger in size that the state of Texas.
Every minute a dustbin lorry of plastic enters the waterways of the world, and it is estimated that by 2050 if things carry on the way they are going that there will be more plastic in there than actual fish!
This prompted Brooklyn-based architecture and design firm StudioKCA to create a monumental installation for the Bruges Triennial 2018 in Belgium. Entitled Skyscraper (The Bruges Whale), the massive instillation was made using 10,000 pounds of plastic waste found in the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans collected in conjunction with the Hawaii Wildlife Fund over the span of 4 months.
Measuring in at 38 feet high, 38 feet wide (fin to fin) and 12 feet in diameter, it’s daunting, intimidating, and guaranteed to make you think.
The firm explained.
‘A whale, breaching from the water, is the first ‘skyscraper of the sea’, and as the largest mammal in the water it felt right from our piece to take in order to show the scope and scale of the problem. Also, we were able to pull over 5 tonnes of plastic out of the ocean in a very short period of time, which means we have material for something large.’
Situated in the canal near to the Jan Van Eyck statue the whale will be on show until September 16th.
For more information please visit StudioKCA’s website here.
