The Art of Recycling.

• Author: Moore, Anne Elizabeth
• Position: Essay

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Calling them mere recyclers misses the point. The Chicago-based artist group Material Exchange makes use of the detritus of consumer culture, sure. But it wants you to think about the objects you surround yourself with: What purpose do they serve now? What use might they be put to in the future?

And so the group transforms recycled material into idiosyncratic pieces of art. But the objects it creates are just the start of the project--which can include a social event, permanent installation, or public resource.

Last winter, for instance, at Northern Michigan University, Material Exchange rendered an old boat in the shape of a turtle. The piece, called I'd Rather Be Fishin' , was set out in the middle of the frozen lake by a group of volunteers, where it remained a static sculpture for months. In the spring, the ice melted and the sculpture sunk to the bottom of the lake. No longer an aesthetic object of admiration or a useful vehicle, the old boat, rebuilt to the Department of Natural Resources specifications, was now a fish habitat. "We can only guess at how well it's working," the group's John Preus explains.

M aterial Exchange started in 2005, when the redheaded Sara Black (recently awarded a prestigious 3Arts grant) and the lanky Preus met at the University of Chicago. The two connected over a shared desire to create useful objects and to challenge an increasingly disposable culture. The group used a Museum of Contemporary Art exhibition to collect and represent three months' worth of museum waste as minimalist-inspired sculptures. The thoughtful David Wolf started working with them then. Alta Buden, who brings scientific experience in biodiversity and conservation to the group, soon came on board, too.

In the intervening years, the group has exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center, Eyebeam, the Experimental Station, the Park Avenue Armory, and other big-name venues. It has also displayed at no-name spaces: that lake in Northern Michigan, a bus stop in Braddock, Pennsylvania. Not exactly places for "high art."

"There's this interesting moment when a thing becomes 'trash,' " Black says. "When something is 'used up' and there's an opening in the life of the thing, you can imagine its potential."

Curator Shannon Stratton of ThreeWalls says Material Exchange "is deeply engaged in the relationship between problem solving with material and craftsmanship." The group, she says, provides "a kind of continual sequence" of...