#OURSEA photo exibition: Johanna Sandin – Washed Ashore
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Johanna Sandin's photographs are made out of plastic waste that she collected on the shores outside her home town of Hankoo in Finland during a whole year. After washing and sorting it, she created installations of the waste. The pieces of art in her exhibition Washed Ashore only exist on photographs - the original installations have all been destroyed.
The exhibition is a part of the #OURSEA campaign, which was started by Moomin Characters in collaboration with the renowned John Nurminen Foundation. The goal of the campaign is to raise one million euros in funds for the foundation’s work in cleaning the Baltic Sea and protecting its heritage. A part of the revenue from the #OURSEA exhibition will be donated to the campaign – buy pictures here.
title:I wanted to create something new for the exhibition in Sanomatalo. Something that connects Washed Ashore with #oursea clearly. I saw the logo on social media, in emails, on websites and other places and I thought it might be possible to make. So I tried. This is how it turned out. And I’m happy. I spent a whole day in the garage. I arranged the plastic pieces, some of which are really small and classified as microplastic, on a white background. Sometimes I had to use tweezers to make small adjustments. The original work is about 70 cm in diameter and photographed straight from above.
title:When I started the Washed Ashore project, the whale tail and fish were on the ToDo list. They are among the first arrangements I made of the smallest pieces of plastic. The seahorse was a whim. I thought about what sea animals I could create and a seahorse came to mind. I googled seahorses, chose a picture and with the phone in hand I arranged the pieces on a white background.
title:My gender-neutral mermaids were also high on the ToDo list. One sunny afternoon I spread out the plastic in a well-organized chaos on a couple of tarpaulins on the lawn. After a lot of trial and error, I created a series of eight mermaids, of which five are in Sanomatalo.
title:Earplugs are frequently found on the beaches closest to the harbor. They come both from the port and from the ships.
title:During a year only two nets were found. That surprised me. There are plenty of ghost nets in the world’s oceans and they are a big problem. I assumed that there would also be a lot of nets in the Baltic Sea. Maybe there are, but they haven’t washed up on the beaches in Hanko.
title:Hold on to the balloons! They do not belong in the sea.
title:A lot of shells. Instead of photographing a large pile of shells, I picked out different colours. I made a circle and photographed from above. I was surprised that there are so many different colors of shells. It is a pity that these end up in the sea. I wonder shells aren’t made in a material that decompose? I wonder why the bird hunters don’t dispose of the shells accordingly? Why do they end up in the sea, where they break down and are eventually eaten by fish and birds, which then end up on our dining tables?
title:The cotton bud’s way to the sea is usually via the toilet. It slips past a lot of filters in the treatment plants and eventually floats freely in the sea.
title:My Hanko motives were given. The carousel at Plagen, the beach hut and the lighthouse remind people of Hanko.
title:703 PET bottles from all Baltic Sea countries. Among them were also bottles with a little more exotic text.
title:Cigarette butts. I stopped counting at 10000. By far the most common plastic rubbish on beaches, in the oceans and in nature in general. Both here at home in Finland and in the world. Do people really not know that the cigarette butt contains plastic and therefore it doesn’t decompose either? Or is it a matter of arrogance and nonchalance? This picture has been the children’s favorite, due to the beach toys and because the cigarette butts look like sand from afar.
title:Ropes. I picked up the big black rope together with three friends after I had received a message on FB from an acquaintance – Hey Hanna, there is a part of a rope on the north shore. You may be able to use it in your plastic project.
title:About 175 single-use mugs and glasses. I have photographed them all individually, exposed them in Photoshop and arranged them digitally on the same background. In the picture there are as many photos as objects. When I made this picture, I thought a lot about why we make disposable things from a material that is extremely durable and never disappears. It’s crazy.
title:About 220 non-pet bottles. All photographed individually and assembled digitally. Interesting to see that a large part of the bottles have contained some kind of detergent. I have a hard time understanding that we care about keeping clean, but that it then is ok to dump empty bottles in the sea. The Hushållsspriit bottle in the picture became my favorite for some reason. It is at least 51 years old, but the colors have held up incredibly well. Wondering what toxins it contains…
title:Lace cloths, mandala – people see different things in the photos. The plastic pieces are slightly larger and photographed from the balcony. A big part of the plastic pieces are unidentifiable. That’s why these pieces regardless ofcolour got the name UPO – Unidentified Plastic Objects.
title:White on black – the latest work. A large puzzle of pieces, which do not belong together.
title:A panorama printed as a triptych. The width is about 180 cm. The plastic in the photos are seals. Unfortunately, they also come mostly from the port.
