Melt

This work investigates the evolving relationship between human-made materials and the natural environment, focusing on the concept of plastistone—a new geological phenomenon in which plastic-based debris becomes embedded within sedimentary rock. Using stones gathered from my local reservoir, I explore how everyday synthetic materials, such as nylon shoelaces, can be transformed through heat and pressure to form new hybrid surfaces.

By melting these synthetic elements directly onto the rocks, the work mimics the geological processes of compression and layering, highlighting the ways in which human presence is becoming materially inscribed into the earth. The tension between permanence and degradation, nature and artifice, is central to the practice, inviting reflection on the slow violence of pollution and the irreversible entanglement of the synthetic within the organic.

Through this material experimentation, I aim to challenge conventional boundaries between the natural and the manufactured, and to open a space for critical dialogue around environmental change, human impact, and the shifting definitions of landscape in the Anthropocene.