Just come back from the Film Theatre at Staffs Uni, a friend took me to see this film, I thought I would go along for the ride, but it was so much more than I expected...
World renound artist Vik Muniz goes back to Brazil, his home, and also the home of the worlds largest landfill area. 70% of all waste in Rio de Jaeneiro ends up in this landfill, and some of the poorest people in the city work in the landfill as pickers. They pick out all of the recyclable material, as Rio has no recycling scheme at the 'home' end of the scale, it all gets separated at the landfill site. 200 tonnes of recyclable material is picked out by these guys each day, then sold on wholesale to recycling processors, who then sell the shredded material to companies that make new end products eg, buckets. What the do is amazing and crucial to Rio's landfill future; but this effort was not recognised.
Vik Muniz set out to find out who these pickers were as people, and captured portraits of them which they then all recreated out of the landfill itself. These were then photographed to preserve them forever. The series of images created 'Pictures of Garbage' were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in Rio where the exhibition attracted over a million visitors....I just hope that those million people, and all those that get to see this brilliant film take something away with them, separate your blummin recycling and re-use whatever you can!
Oh also, Vik donated over $50,000 to the association that looks after the pickers well being on site from the sales of some of the images.
World renound artist Vik Muniz goes back to Brazil, his home, and also the home of the worlds largest landfill area. 70% of all waste in Rio de Jaeneiro ends up in this landfill, and some of the poorest people in the city work in the landfill as pickers. They pick out all of the recyclable material, as Rio has no recycling scheme at the 'home' end of the scale, it all gets separated at the landfill site. 200 tonnes of recyclable material is picked out by these guys each day, then sold on wholesale to recycling processors, who then sell the shredded material to companies that make new end products eg, buckets. What the do is amazing and crucial to Rio's landfill future; but this effort was not recognised.
Vik Muniz set out to find out who these pickers were as people, and captured portraits of them which they then all recreated out of the landfill itself. These were then photographed to preserve them forever. The series of images created 'Pictures of Garbage' were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in Rio where the exhibition attracted over a million visitors....I just hope that those million people, and all those that get to see this brilliant film take something away with them, separate your blummin recycling and re-use whatever you can!
Oh also, Vik donated over $50,000 to the association that looks after the pickers well being on site from the sales of some of the images.
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