Have you ever regretted a purchase? I definitely have. Collecting art materials is a guilty pleasure for me. Every time I stepped into Art Friend, I would walk out with something new, even if I didn’t need it. By the time I discovered that this was getting out of hand, it was too late and my shelves were already filled to the brim. In the end, I only used a small handful of these materials and the rest just sat there. Tired of keeping all these extra materials, I ended up throwing some of them away (which was an absolute mistake).
My art material stash (still a lot even after clearing some off)
Thinking back on my (shameful) actions made me realise how I fell victim to the linear economy. What exactly is the linear economy? The linear economy is a phenomenon where products experience a one-way life cycle. An item is created, used and then disposed of once it reaches the end of its lifespan (Government of the Netherlands, n.d.). Profit is generated from this model by producing more and purchasing higher quantities, which can encourage wasteful consuming habits. Unfortunately, many of the art materials I use follow this life cycle (in some cases, I even skip the usage step and go straight to disposal), which definitely adds to the amount of waste I produce from practising art. Is there any solution to this?
Thankfully there is, and that’s where the circular economy comes in! Through such an economy, resources are incorporated back into the cycle of production or are actively reused. As such, a smaller amount of resources is maximised, cutting down on both the amount we consume and waste (Sariatli, 2017). How can this be applied to our art practice? We can start to move towards such a cycle by selling or donating old art materials to others instead of disposing of them. By keeping them out of the trash, their lifespans can be prolonged and remain in use for a longer period of time! Not only would this help to cut down on waste, it would also help your pre-loved art materials to find a new and loving home! Determined to amend my past mistakes, I have begun to sell or give away my leftover art materials.
Revisiting the circular economy concept made me wonder if others did the same too! As such, I conducted a survey among my artist friends to see how they managed their art practice. When asked about what they do with unused materials, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that 64.8% of the respondents opted to donate, sell, reuse leftover materials.
Furthermore, 88.2% of the participants also expressed that they were willing to make changes towards sustainability, suggesting that artists are becoming increasingly aware of the waste their practice may create.
While my sample size is a little small, I still think it’s great that more artists are adopting the circular economy approach and perhaps we can all begin to practice art sustainably by starting with small actions like these!
References
Government of the Netherlands. (n.d.) From a linear to a circular economy. Retrieved from https://www.government.nl/topics/circular-economy/from-a-linear-to-a-circular-economy.
Sariatli, F. (2017). Linear Economy Versus Circular Economy: A Comparative and Analyzer Study for Optimization of Economy for Sustainability. Visegrad Journal on Bioeconomy and Sustainable Development, 6(1), 31-34. Retrieved from https://content.sciendo.com/view/journals/vjbsd/6/1/article-p31.xml.
October 23, 2020 at 7:41 pm
Hi Sarah-Ann!
It’s definitely great to see that artists are contributing to the circular economy by donating, selling or reusing leftover materials. Wanted to ask, does reusing waste like cardboard, aluminium cans etc for art creation counted as part of the circular economy? Or does it belong to a different category? Would appreciate your clarification!
Cheers,
Yu Xun
October 23, 2020 at 9:33 pm
Hi Yu Xun, thank you for the question! If the materials you mentioned are used for art creation, I believe that they can be considered as a part of the circular economy as these materials have been reused for artistic purposes.
October 26, 2020 at 9:00 pm
On another note, do feel free to leave a comment or contact me privately if you would like to get some of my art materials! I’ve begun to specialise in illustration and painting so I don’t really use most of the other materials. Other than the stack on the far right (the image with the blue cloth), everything else in the photos will be sold for a low price or be given away for free. Please take them off me.
October 27, 2020 at 9:33 pm
Hi Sarah,
This was such an interesting read as I have just written about a circular economy for an external project. I was wondering, however, in the case of art supplies that might wear out after some time such as paint that dries up and sponges that disintegrate, would there be any way to put these items a second life or are they no longer usable?
Looking forward to hearing from you!
Mark
October 28, 2020 at 9:17 pm
Hi Mark, thanks for the question! Some paints like watercolour can still be used after they have dried up. Simply add a little bit of water to the dried watercolour paint and it can be used again. While watercolours can be used again, not all paints can be reused after they are dry. You might not want to reuse dried oil paints as they may contain some toxic properties. As for dried acrylic paint, it would be hard to turn it back into its liquid form unless toxic additives are introduced, but there are always other things we can use dried acrylic paints for. Take this for example, artists have a lot of dried acrylic paint that ends up on their palettes. If we peel them off, we can cut them into any desired shape we want and make them into coasters for drinks since they are waterproof! Old sponges can be cut up and used as cushioning material for fragile items.
Last but not least, we can always use these worn out materials to create another artwork! I think it would be very interesting to see an artwork made of disintegrating or hardened materials. These are merely just some suggestions but I hope they have given you some insight on some creative ways old art materials can be given a second life.