Year of Plastic, Family of Four

How much plastic packaging do you go through in a year? Would it fill a closet? Cover a football field? I had wondered this question since Denver began offering composting services and I noticed that what remained in my trash can after I removed all the compostable food waste was primarily plastic packaging. So in 2019, I recruited a good friend to help me answer this very question. For an entire year, she faithfully collected and washed her family’s single-use plastic, sending me a tidy package every month. I pieced together the contents of each package she sent in the spirit of a “crazy quilt,” sorting by color and month each piece was collected. The resulting assemblage, 26 feet long and 26 feet wide, is a playful but serious look at just how much plastic slips through our hands on an annual basis. 

Kalliopi Monoyios is an artist working to mature the conversation around plastic and plastic pollution. She uses art to start conversations and raise awareness of topics that people might not pursue on their own.