Can beauty come out of the dumps in slums around the world? Recycled materials are already being used in furniture and fashion. "Social sculpture" is providing an environmentally-friendly update to the older idea of a community coming together to paint a mural on the side of a building. In a new way, globalization is showing how it is possible to bring beauty out of museums and galleries and into the lives of people on the street.While artists direct social sculpture projects (Read about Theaster Gates in the earlier post, "Global Drawing Power."), people, including children, collect the recycled materials that go into the art and often help develop designs. Victor Castro has orchestrated public art projects in Mexico and Peru. For his social sculpture in Madison, Wisconsin, he invited members of the community to bring cans, bottles, cartons, and all manner of clean discarded food containers to their local libraries. At one school, children worked together to create their own collages of recycled materials. Some of their works may become part of the 2000-piece library mural Castro expects to complete this summer.
In the later blog post, "Idea Transfer," see how children can imitate the French artist who made sculptures out of toilet paper rolls.
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