Royal Geography Society IBG, Annual International Conference, 2017, London

Live RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2017

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Presenting paper at Royal Geography Society IBG, Annual International Conference, 2017, London
Wednesday 30 August 2017, Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40)
2017 conference theme ‘decolonising geographical knowledges’. 
Session chaired Les Levidow (The Open University, UK)
Session 1 ‘Treating waste as a resource
Abstract:
 
KraalD: plastic re-use strategy
 
Katarina Dimitrijevic (Goldsmiths, University of London, UK)
We live in a plastic debris era. Anthropogenic litter is present in all marine habitats, from the coast to the most remote points in the oceans. Unmanaged, discarded globally, eight million tons of plastic enters the ocean every year (Jambeck et al., 2010). This already outdated statistic on the rise, accumulates the same amount of plastic, that the entire world produced in 1961. Without waste management infrastructure improvements, the cumulative quantity of plastic waste available to enter the ocean from land is predicted to increase by an order of magnitude by 2025 (Jambeck et al., 2015). KraalD is a design praxis, embedded in a social narrative which strives to journey beyond the product design vocabulary, exploding the design advocacy framework within socio-cultural, environmental and critical discard topics. The praxis argues that a “changing relation to disposal is a changing relation to oneself.” (Hawkins, 2006) Taking on climate change through our everyday plastic litter. Thus, praxis aim is to promote the minimization of future urban landfill, nurturing a socially relational and eco-centric attitude. This paper suggests to examine self-led, design case study i.e. KraalD and visually narrate plastic re-use strategy in order to change value for the plastic waste. How can we individually transgress the surplus-driven consumer culture? Perhaps in taking on the seemingly valueless discarded plastic. In transposing plastic things into plastic soup, 3D Gyra installations and re-used products. We can reveal how disposed plastic materiality can contain a dimension for new spaces of possibility, creating new values and even hope for a global 21st century depollution.
 

 

Workshop with the sea and pollution / design transposal : Visualising through the Gyre !

KraalD/UCA, Designtransposal Workshop, at Creative Challenge Event, London, 25 March, 2015

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They talk about plastic rubbish in the ocean !

Progress is not all good. Our world plastic consumption continues to rise,  In the first decade of the twenty-first century plastic production has quadrupled in comparison to the last. Oceans are the largest unprotected ecosystem on Earth. Anthropogenic litter, as it is termed, is present in all marine habitats and plastic and metal are the most prevalent litter item found on the deep sea bed. Plastic waste travels and is concentrated in five rotating currents, known as gyres. Marine research has revealed that synthetic polymers are a toxic pollutant spread throughout all the world’s oceans. Currently 269,000 tons of plastic composed of 5.25 trillion particles are afloat at sea. The impacts of plastic pollution after entering the food chain, through ingestion are: cancer, malformation and impaired reproductive ability. Sadly this problem is more complex then it seems. The meso-level fish rise 300 metres…

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Workshop: Opening the Bin – New perspectives on waste, culture and society from the humanities and the social sciences, 2017.

Reflections on ‘Opening the Bin’ (and waste research more generally)Workshop: Opening the Bin – New perspectives on waste, culture and society from the humanities and the social sciences, 2017.

Discard Studies

Opening the Bin – New perspectives on waste, culture and society from the humanities and the social sciences
– Lund University, Helsingborg Campus, Sweden, April 27-28, 2017
The production and management of waste comprise a vast array of socio-material practices that together shape many aspects of contemporary culture and society. Simultaneously, the challenges of climate and environmental change and the contribution of society’s consumption to global warming and natural resource depletion make the issue of waste management crucial for contemporary societies and for their wider ecological footprints. Yet, despite its eminently social and cultural nature, waste often remains merely positioned in theoretical and practical discourses as a technical and natural scientific issue. Social scientific and humanist research on waste is alive and well, but splintered, and with a limited impact on what ends up in bins and dumpsters.
The purpose of this two-day transdisciplinary workshop is to gather scholars from the social…

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The EcoTales Festival at Springtime Safari!

Ecotales press

The piece she has created for EcoTales is called ‘Thirst’. The wave of reused plastic bottles are a reminder of the millions of plastic objects that are manufactured to be used only once and then thrown away into landfill. They represent our disposable lifestyle and culture in the 21st Century. It makes us think about how our lifestyle revolves around things that we just throw away.
The artist is london based Katarina Dimitrijecvic. She operates as KraalD Designedisposal and as well as creating installations from urban plastic trash, she also creates furniture and jewellery using plastic waste materials as an integral part of the finished product. Through exhibitions and workshops she aims to reduce future landfill and she explores recycling and design around re-using things that were made to be disposable.

She is showing us how something so familiar to us can be interepreted in a different way. And with her upcycled designer products she is recreating plastic into useful and beautiful things that we will use and enjoy for years to come.
In fact, they can become objects of desire and useful production materials.
Come and see her installation on Sunday and then meet her too as she will be bringing a selection of her amazing products along.