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Do you know what 3 tons of garbage looks like? It can look like this... or this... or even
this. But if you're artist Angela Haseltine Pozzi you can turn 3 tons of debris into this.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: Henry is becoming our mascot, he's almost becoming our logo
for the Washed Ashore Project.
Washed Ashore is a community project Haseltine Pozzi started in her coastal Oregon town.
The non-profit organization strives to educate and create awareness about plastic pollution
through art.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: We don't cut up everything into beautiful tiny little pieces where you
can't see where it came from, this is the real stuff. You can actually tell that that's
a bottle.
Or that's a garbage bin lid.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: And it came ashore and I thought that's gotta be a turtle. Most
of the stuff that we get off the beach is coming from the middle of the ocean or from
overseas. We process it by hosing it down and sorting it and scrubbing it and soaking
it and cutting it, drilling it.
Then she turns the trash into beautiful sculptures like this jellyfish made of discarded water
bottles.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: This is meant to move and meant to be interacted in.
But it also has a message.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: The sea jellies in the ocean are looking just like plastic bags
to turtles and turtles eat jellyfish.
That message gets through to kids like 9-year-old Meghan Palitz.
MEGHAN: Some leatherback sea turtles eat jellyfish and if a plastic bag is floating in the ocean
it also looks a lot like jellyfish and they'll eat it.
The accessibility of the art attracted Dr. Brian Joseph, the executive director of the
Living Coast Discovery Center.
BRIAN JOSEPH: I was overwhelmed and touched; it was something that was understandable by
children, it's something that they can touch, everyday objects, colorful things out of their
own lives that end up in the environment, and I thought it had a really powerful message
for children.
The Center's purpose is to connect people to nature and the environment with the hope
of encouraging positive change. Washed Ashore directly addresses that message by drawing
attention to ocean pollution in a novel way.
BRIAN JOSEPH: When you first look at these you think these are very beautiful sculptures,
and then when you approach them closer and closer you are filled with horror because
they are everyday items that we discard in the environment.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: People don't realize how bad it is by just listening to statistics
and people talking and seeing charts and I thought I need to do something that makes
people really not ignore the problem. so make giant animal and they won't ignore it.
In addition to Henry the Fish, there are also Styrofoam coral reefs, a Flip Flop Fish, and
a fish made of plastic pieces with tooth marks from sea creatures that tried to eat the plastic
and most likely died as a result.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: Although this is a small piece but sometimes people feel it's
the most powerful because the bite marks by fish and crab in plastic.
Haseltine Pozzi was an educator for 3 decades before she started researching the impact
of plastics on ocean habitats.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: The plastic pollution problem in the ocean is huge and a massive
problem and it is affecting every bench in the entire world. And it's basically because
humans have created this thing called plastic which lasts forever
She was confident her clever recycling of trash would appeal to kids. But she wanted
to reach an even wider audience.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: I don't want to be preaching to the choir, I do want to reach
people who do litter on the beach.
Because the Washed Ashore Exhibit can show them how every action has a tangible result.
ANGELA HASELTINE POZZI: I tell people every piece of plastic here in this whole exhibit
was once purchased by somebody and then it got tossed aside. And then it traveled and
landed on a beach. One person at a time decided to pick up one piece of plastic at a time.
The Living Coast Discovery Center plans to use the exhibit to prompt a larger environmental
education effort because as Haseltine Pozzi says, "Every piece of plastic tells a story
– and it never goes away."