Artist Laura Mychal shares her work which uses recycled materials to explore environmental themes and issues.
My work focuses on my emotional and physical connection to nature and the environment around me. I often create texture with paper, cardboard, cloth, plastic bags and other things gathered from around me as a practice in self-awareness at consumption and waste. I work with paint to transform the materials and create textured landscapes.
Found materials in art have traditionally bridged the gap between art and life and I seek to continue that thread while simultaneously meditating on our world issue of waste. I integrate the material in such a way to express a sense of harmony and hope.
FOREST
Recycled cardboard, paper, and oil paint on canvas.
BROOKLYN
Recycled packing peanuts, cardboard, paper and oil on canvas.
PLASTIC PERSON
Recycled plastic bags sculpted and oil paint on canvas.
GLACIER
Recycled newspaper stuffed canvas sewn onto canvas with twine, and oil paint on canvas.
ISLA
Recycled paint scraps, cloth, paper, paper towel and oil paint on canvas.
Laura Mychal is an artist and art educator originally from Northern California, now living and working in Brooklyn, NY. She has always been extremely inspired by the environment and as an artist, knew that she wanted to explore that in her work. She started by using natural materials and gathered sticks and exploring the human connection to nature. Yet, through her service in the Peace Corps in Peru, working as an environmental volunteer from 2011-2013, she began to recognize climate change as a huge issue. Laura taught locals how to recycle and subsequently began using the recycled material in her sculptures and paintings.
