Trash into treasured art

KIDS can transform trash into art at a mega manufacturing showcase in Dandenong.
Dandenong South’s Smart Recycling will use a display at Smart Manufacturing ’16 – Dandenong and South East Melbourne on Show to inspire a new generation of artists to see worth in materials that society discarded.
Committee for Dandenong (C4D) and its partners are presenting the expo-style event on Tuesday 17 May to promote the region’s capability and capacity.
The 35-acre Smart Recycling site was once a tip and has become an unlikely place for artistic inspiration.
Artists and designers regularly visit the site to salvage industrial timber packaging waste to be used in their celebrated designs.
Even chef Shannon Bennet has used timber from the site as platters in his award-winning restaurant Vue de Monde.
Smart Recycling managing director Ward Petherbridge said his Smart Kids Zone would feature art and gardening projects using the materials recycled at the site.
Kids can get their hands dirty planting herbs to take home using recycled soil and mulch, and they can combine graphic stencils and bright paints with timber off-cuts.
They’ll be able to take home a free model train and truck kit designed by Smart Recycling production manager Loe Hagai.
For further inspiration, the stand will showcase past entries from Create from a Crate, a biennial exhibition where woodworkers turn two timber packaging crates into art.
Smart Recycling divert 50,000 tonnes of waste annually from landfill through their recycling activities.
Mr Petherbridge said enough pallets, crates and other waste timbers to fill the MCG 1.5 times were discarded each year.
“To turn this trend around we need to educate a new generation of Victorian decision-makers to understand the importance of recycling,” he said.
“Getting creative with waste is a great way to urge young people to be less wasteful and look for the gems in our rubbish.”