From plastic water bottles to discarded children’s toys, plastic in every shape, size and color floats in gigantic swirling garbage patches across the oceans. The majority of this trash starts on land, and then ends up dumped or blown into the sea. For every piece of trash we see washed up on the shore, there are thousands more pounds collecting in an oozing, melting mess in every ocean across the planet, threatening fish, sea birds and the ecosystems’ fragile existence.
Costa, a company committed to sustainable sport fishing practices and ocean conservation, launched its Kick Plastic campaign earlier this year to educate its customers about the growing ocean trash issue, and encourage them to kick the plastic habit. The brand commissioned a nine-foot tall, seven-foot long jumping marlin sculpture created entirely out of beach trash to serve as a stark reminder of the problem we need urgently to solve.
The fish art was designed and created by artist Angela Pozzi and her team of volunteers from the non-profit organization Washed Ashore. They assembled the sculpture using thousands of collected plastic and metal pieces found on beaches along the West coast of the United States.
A toy truck tire sliced in half makes up the outer ring of the marlin’s eyes, with pieces from a child’s plastic ball, a blue plastic automotive oil bottle, bottle lids and aluminum cans adding to the creation. Silver flip flop pieces, plastic water bottles, a mayonnaise jar lid and a baby bowl from Japan – all found washed ashore – went into the mix to create this magnificent piece of art.
The sculpture is meant start conversations about how everyone can become more involved in addressing the plastic problem. Costa produced a short video illustrating the making of the plastic art sculpture, seen here http://bit.ly/makingofamarlin.
As part of the solution, Costa now offers a new stainless steel Klean Kanteen water bottle, a reusable heavy-duty tote bag made entirely out of recycled plastic bottles, and a line of t-shirts made from 50 percent polyester comprised of recycled bottles and plastics, and 50 percent organic cotton. The products are now available online at www.costadelmar.com.
“Plastic is everywhere, it’s unavoidable,” said Al Perkinson, vice president of marketing for Costa. “But we can work together to make small changes that will create a huge positive impact, such as swapping out our plastic bottles for a permanent one, or collecting plastic we find on the beaches and recycling it.”
“Our goal with the Kick Plastic campaign is to start conversations about how we can all work together to address this issue head on,” said Perkinson. “If left unchecked, we can assume our oceans will be taken over with a floating plastic smog in a very short time.”
International Coastal Clean Up Day, celebrating its 30th anniversary, takes place on Saturday, September 19, 2015, along coastlines all over the world. In support of this global effort, Costa plans to host a cleanup day with employees at a beach near its Atlantic Coast headquarters in Florida.
For more information on Washed Ashore and its other works of plastic art, visit www.washedashore.org.
For more information on Costa’s Kick Plastic message, or to join in the global movement, visit http://bit.ly/kickplastic. Also, watch and share the short animated video explaining the plastic pollution problem here, http://bit.ly/kickplasticvid.
