Seamore the Seal
 
Seamore the Seal was inspired by the state of the oceans now saturated with plastic. Eventually the plastic breaks down into micro-plastic tiny pieces that are ingested by all forms of marine life. This plastic makes its way up the food chain and into our own diets. The entanglement of netting and fishing gear as well as suffocation and toxins from the ocean floor to the surface is causing havoc for all marine creatures. There are now five gigantic plastic gyres that ride the currents and spread for hundreds of miles. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch off the coast of California is now larger than the state of Texas. Nature recycles detritus by processing its nutrients for the healthy growth of many life forms. Plastic is a different story: it can take many hundreds of years to break down, and has no nutritional value. We have tipped the natural balance needed by the earth to clean up our waste. Now it is time for us to use less plastic, or reuse or locally recycle what we already have.

Seamore’s skin is made of a variety of plastic containers that was used and collected by me and my neighbors for about three months. The plastic skin is attached with wire to the shaped hardware cloth which is anchored to the aluminum armature. The plastic detritus in his belly is all the other plastic that cannot be recycled at our dump.