plastic in paradisum is a creative interrogation of the social processes that confer value on the objects that surround us. The project is a digital, interactive archive of plastic objects I found washed up on the beach at Dead Horse Bay. This is the final presentation I gave for the project.

1. plastic in paradisum

3. plastic in paradisum is a creative interrogation
of the social processes that confer value on the
objects that surround us. The project is a digital,
interactive archive of plastic objects I found
washed up on the beach at Dead Horse Bay.

4. the concept

7. 1. defamiliarize
2. make hyper-visible
3. re-examine

8. I have long thought that if we respect plastic’s history as
a petroleum substance formed across the vastness of
geologic time and its future as a material bound to
outlive us and most if not all conceivable future
generations, then we might treat it with the greatest
respect instead of as mere junk.
Bonnie McDonald, Sacred Waste: Performance Pedagogy,
Plastic Shamanism, and Ten Thousand Pieces of Trash

9. We are the garbage, the waste, we make it and
dump it, to be separated from it is a cancer
causing delusion…we cannot separate ourselves,
clean and perfect, from the trash we dump out
back into the can. Clean is a vision of internal
trash, not a mere separation.
Gerald Vizenor, “Landfill Meditation”

10. the process

13. manufacturer

14. manufacturer
origin

15. manufacturer
origin
date created

16. manufacturer
origin
date created
history

17. manufacturer
origin
date created
history
cultural relevance

18. the outcome

20. the website:
http://cargocollective.com/plastic-in-paradisum
the 3D gallery:
https://sketchfab.com/baricks/collections/plastic-in-
paradisum
email me:
baricks@gmail.com

21. Further reading:
Jane Bennet, Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things
Max Liboiron, https://discardstudies.com/
Bonnie McDonald, Sacred Waste: Performance Pedagogy,
Plastic Shamanism, and Ten Thousand Pieces of Trash
Susan Signe Morrison, The Literature of Waste: Material
Ecopoetics and Ethical Matter

22. the feedback