The Gigantic Plywood Art of Henrique Oliveira

Take some old plywood strips and stain them with wood stain. Then start sticking them together. Eventually you might end up with artwork as awesome as this.

Brazilian artist Henrique Oliveira uses salvaged wood collected from the streets of São Paulo to create massive scale, site-specific installations with dense layers that twist, curve, bend, and split. Oliveira uses tapumes - which in Portuguese can mean fencing, boarding, or enclosure - as a title for many of his large-scale installations. Henrique's breakthrough occurred when he was a student at the University of São Paulo, where for two years the view from his studio window was a wooden construction fence. Over time Oliveira began to see the deterioration of the wood and its separation into multiple layers and colours. One week before the final student show opened, the construction was finished and the worn out plywood fence was discarded.

Discovered here.

Rubbish Art - Supplemental

A few more artists who make art from recycled materials:

Sue Beatrice (website here) makes exquisite artwork from old watch and clock parts. She's a mean sculptor too.

Meanwhile, the mysterious 'Mister Finch' makes plants and animals using vintage fabrics. His website is here.

And then there's Kyle Bean who makes chickens from eggshells, mobile phone Russian dolls from cardboard, and portraits from pencil shavings. The man is a genius.

The second batch of rubbish art of 2014 ...

I have a particular fondness for art that's made from recycled materials. Don't believe me? See here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here ... and that's just for starters.

Last month I found the amazing work of Edouard Martinet. This week I discovered the extraordinary talent of Exeter-based artist Jane Perkins whose 'Plastic Classics' bring famous masterpieces to new life with recycled and found items. They're quite amazing.

 

 

There's a lot more of her work to be found on her website here.

Big Fish

I bloody love these; giant fish made from discarded drinks bottles. They're on display at Botafogo beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where the UN Conference on Sustainable Development is being hosted.

Photo credit: Victor R. Caivano / AP, Ueslei Marcelino / Reuters