Recycling Gets Hip at Children’s Art Museum

Mesa, AZ - Who says junk is worthless? It’s all the RAGE! The Arizona Museum for Youth’s [AMY] newest exhibition: Full Circle: Recycled into Art makes the chic notion, “Trash to treasure,” trendy again. That’s right, what’s old is now new again.

In this innovative exhibition, artists engage their craft by transforming discarded items and junk into objects that have beauty, meaning, and form. Ingenious ideas are applied by recycling broken toys into human sculptures, discarded street signs into chairs, and old watches into faithful watch dogs.
Outside-of-the-box improvisation characterizes the artwork by exhibiting artist, David Adix.
“I regard these components as fossil-like evidence of what humans leave behind. To me, they are beautiful vestiges of time. In the detritus (human sculptures), there is energy and a history already infused within them revealing form and the internal-external workings of a native figure with new meaning, life and a memory of its own.”

Artist Boris Bally blurs the perceived boundaries between craft, art and design as he uses the potential elegance and bold graphics of discarded aluminum. Trained as a Swiss goldsmith, Bally says that scrap street signs are ripe for the battles of our decade. He says that signage has become his medium of choice because of the positive recycling message it provides.

“They have an obvious environmental message displaying the mockery of precious materials which are symbolic of the American struggle for wealth and success and have a subtle defiance of authority.”
Ramona Otto’s inspiration comes from traditional American folk art themes and the desire to recycle vintage pieces from flea markets and yard sales. Through her art, Otto seeks to model creative thinking, perseverance, the importance of humor, and a sense of passion and fun that comes from being a lifelong learner. The watch dog exhibit clearly represents such aspiration.

Overall, there are 16 ingenious artists exhibiting at AMY: Scott McNeill, David Adix, Boris Bally, Paul Bowen, Patricia Chapman, Mallory Cremin, Denise A. Currier, Zarco Guerrero, Jerry Jacobson, Aaron Kramer, Matt Mays, Ramona Otto, Caitlin Phillips, Dorothy Rissman, S. A. Schimmel Gold, and Paul Villinski.

There’s so much to see and learn. Come experience hip works of recycled art at AMY today. It’s fun the whole family can join in while learning to make old junk… stylish, useful, and modern. AMY is also pleased to collaborate with the City of Mesa’s Solid Waste Department on this exhibition to inspire and educate visitors to: Reduce. Reuse. Recycle!  Full Circle: Recycled into Art runs from Oct. 3 – Feb. 8, 2009.

The Arizona Museum for Youth (AMY) is a fine arts museum for children and families and serves as a terrific place to introduce your family to life-changing art. The museum hosts 6 world-class exhibitions, annually, and also features ArtVille, a special art-town for kids under 4 years of age. As part of the exhibitions, a dynamic array of art classes, fun workshops, and family programs are available to teach art principles and techniques. Located at 35 N. Robson in downtown Mesa, AMY is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday, 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. Please visit www.arizonamuseumforyouth.com or call 480.644.2467 for current information.