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October 27, 2014


Today's Repurposeful Monday is a little, well, different.  And after
reading it you might never look the same way at trash on the street.  

Contemporary artist Kim Alsbrook produces tongue-in-cheek
creations that pair society's waste and her skill as a classic portraitist.

Her art?  She paints beautiful historic portraits on flattened
aluminum cans she picks up off the street:

"The trash is found flat on the street.  One cannot flatten the trash.  It just doesn't work.  It must be found so that there are no wrinkles in the middle and the graphic should be well centered.  Then the portraits are found that are complimentary to the particular trash.  Generally, I depict miniature portraits from the Watercolor or Ivory Era (17th - 18th century, more or less.)  The trash is gessoed in the oval shape, image drawn in graphite, painted in oils and varnished." -- Kim Alsbrook







I like that the orange soda can background
compliments the auburn hair of Kim's model.


When I first viewed Kim's creations I thought of my grandmother's quip - "From a sow's ear into a silk purse" - but, honestly, I still see a lot of the sow's ear.  Maybe that's part of Kim's message.

3 comments:

  1. I know some one who made a shower curtain using the tabs from a soda can.( it needed lining of course.)
    In the seventies the tab would come out. Later on they started making cans from which the tab could stay on the can even after the can is opened.

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  2. Brilliant, not sure that I would want them though!

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  3. Hi Jan!! That is really creative imagination at it's finest! Who would have thought of something like this?

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