An Ecosystem of Excess is an art project by artist and researcher Pinar Yoldas. The project addresses a series of ecological problems such as man-made extreme environments,

consumer capitalism Consumer capitalism is a theoretical economic and social political condition in which consumer demand is manipulated in a deliberate and coordinated way on a very large scale through mass-marketing techniques, to the advantage of sellers. Thi ...

plastic pollution Plastic pollution is the accumulation of plastic objects and particles (e.g. plastic bottles, bags and microbeads) in the Earth's environment that adversely affects humans, wildlife and their habitat. Plastics that act as pollutants are catego ...

and

threatened species A threatened species is any species (including animals, plants and fungi) which is vulnerable to extinction in the near future. Species that are threatened are sometimes characterised by the population dynamics measure of ''critical depensatio ...

in the age of the

Anthropocene ''Anthropocene'' is a term that has been used to refer to the period of time during which human impact on the environment, humanity has become a planetary force of change. It appears in scientific and social discourse, especially with respect to ...

. Yoldas was awarded the Ernst Schering Foundation Arts & Culture Grant for her project, and An Ecosystem of Excess was premiered in Ernst Schering Project Space in Berlin in 2014."Pinar Yoldas: An Ecosystem of Excess"
''Ernst Schering Foundation'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. The project is an artistic imagination of a post-anthropocene

ecosystem An ecosystem (or ecological system) is a system formed by Organism, organisms in interaction with their Biophysical environment, environment. The Biotic material, biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and en ...

where non-human living creatures are evolved to digest plastic while human species goes extinct. It portrays the future story of alien life forms that emerge from the

Great Pacific Garbage Patch The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (also Pacific trash vortex and North Pacific Garbage Patch) is a garbage patch, a gyre of marine debris particles, in the central North Pacific Ocean. It is located roughly from 135°W to 155°W and 35°N ...

, in the form of a

dystopian A dystopia (lit. "bad place") is an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives. It is an imagined place (possibly state) in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmenta ...

re-staging of

Abiogenesis Abiogenesis is the natural process by which life arises from non-living matter, such as simple organic compounds. The prevailing scientific hypothesis is that the transition from non-living to living entities on Earth was not a single even ...

. For the project, Yoldas worked with

marine biologist Marine biology is the scientific study of the biology of marine life, organisms that inhabit the sea. Given that in biology many phyla, families and genera have some species that live in the sea and others that live on land, marine biology clas ...

Sylvia Earle Sylvia Alice Earle (born August 30, 1935) is an American marine biologist, oceanographer, explorer, author, and lecturer. She has been a National Geographic Explorer at Large (formerly Explorer in Residence) since 1998. Earle was the first fem ...

."Welcome to the Plastivorizene"
''Stylepark'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. An Ecosystem of Excess is a work informed by scientific research which confirms the emergence of new bacteria which adapt to plastic environments or what is scientifically called the

plastisphere The plastisphere is a human-made ecosystem consisting of organisms able to live on plastic waste. Plastic marine debris, most notably microplastics, accumulates in aquatic environments and serves as a habitat for various types of microorganisms ...

, yet, it is a product of speculative fiction that takes inspiration but departs from science."Pinar Yoldas: An Ecosystem of Excess"
''Aksioma'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. It points to evolution and how this process is indirectly altered by human intervention in the age of

."Shaping Alternative Futures: Interview with Pinar Yoldas
''Digicult'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. The work involves a creative exaggeration of scientific facts, and more generally, a research about "the collaborative potential between art and biological sciences.""Digital Humanities Lecture: Pinar Yoldas"
''UCLA Center for Digital Humanities'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. Artist-theorists

Zach Blas Zach Blas is an artist and writer based in London. Blas was a lecturer in Visual culture, visual cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London, and is now an assistant professor of visual studies at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Lan ...

and Christopher O'Leary describe the work as a design of "synthetic biological systems as a living critique of our society." The project has been exhibited internationally, in venues such as ZKM

Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe The ZKM , Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe (until March 2016: ZKM Center for Art and Media Technology), a cultural institution, was founded in 1989 and, since 1997, is located in a former munitions factory in Karlsruhe, Germany. The ZKM (Germa ...

(2014),"GLOBALE: Exo-Evolution"
''ZKM'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. Aksioma Institute for Contemporary Arts in Slovenia (2014), NAMOC National Art Museum of Beijing (2014), Polytech Museum Moscow (2015), ISCP

International Studio & Curatorial Program International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) is a contemporary art institution that runs an international residency program and related exhibitions and events based in Brooklyn, New York. ISCP's exhibitions, talks, screenings and lectures gen ...

in New York (2015),"Aqueous Earth"
''ISCP'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (2016),"Regeneration Movement: Rethinking Technology in the Digital Age"
''NTMOFA'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. BOZAR Center for Fine Arts in Brussels (2017)"Future Emerging Art and Technology"
''BOZAR'', Retrieved 28 November 2017 and Calit2 Gallery at

UC San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego in communications material, formerly and colloquially UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California, United States. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Sc ...

(2017)"Artist Offers Dystopic Vision of New Life Forms Emerging from Great Pacific Garbage Patch"
''Calit 2'', Retrieved 27 November 2017. In May 2014, ''An Ecosystem of Excess'' was also published as a book by Argobooks.

References

{{reflist

External links

Pinar Yoldas Imagines Future Life Inside the Pacific Trash Vortex, ''Vice''.
Environmental art