pol·y·eth·yl·ene
/ˌpälēˈeTHəlēn/
noun
a tough, light, flexible synthetic resin made by polymerizing ethylene, chiefly used for plastic bags, food containers, and other packaging.
(definition provided by Oxford Languages)
POLYETHYLENE is the most widely used and least recycled* plastic in the world and over the past year and a half this “non recyclable” waste has seduced me into transforming it into jewelry. Collecting every scrap, chasing bags down the street I have gotten to know it intimately.
*in its “film” form
I imagine that Polyethylene is dreaming through me. I’m just hear to listen - a medium helping it realize its wildest (and most luxurious!) dreams… It became so clear: of course a material that is treated as cheap trash would dream of being treated as the most precious object known to humanity: jewelry.
Jeanne Marie Martineau (she/they) is an artist, dreamworker and facilitator who is fascinated by the ways we imagine and create reality using sound and image. She has always been excited by beautiful human made objects, studying Aesthetic and Cultural Theory in her undergrad at UC Berkeley before going on to spend her entire post-college career in jewelry.
In February of 2021, after over 7.5 years with Cartier, Jeanne Marie quit her job to make art full time. She envisioned herself leaving New York to sing and dance on the beaches of South East Asia, but, destiny took her in a different direction landing her in Baltimore instead where she started to create Jewelry from recycled plastic trash.
Baltimore became her creative cradle and the welcoming community at the Baltimore Jewelry Center, its classes and studio space, a second home. She learns from teacher Andy Lowrie who always encourages her to lean into ambitious projects and find multiple ways of approaching engineering and creation.
Additionally, Jeanne Marie apprenticed with goldsmith Savannah King who practices jewelry as sacred adornment and works with gold in the ancient way, alloying, forging, and milling gold from scratch. Savannah shares Jeanne Marie’s reverence for materials and contemplative approach and while nurtured by Savannah’s intuition, generosity and savoir-faire Jeanne Marie created her first gold pieces.
the project
I have been compelled by recycling plastic and to pickup trash off the ground since high school and am eternally inspired by Precious Plastic an organization dedicated to making plastic waste recycling accessible.
My Process
Collecting and documenting: I have collected hundreds of pieces of plastic from my own trash, off the streets or on beaches, in multiple countries, and from friends and family. With the help of several paid Maryland Institute College of Art interns I am first photographing and documenting every piece of plastic that comes my way and getting to know it. What type of plastic is it? Where did it come from? What was its use in its previous life? Each bit of data is saved into a registry we’ve created. This phase of the project places material in context and maps its current relationship to the people it has traveled between.
Reverence: Once the plastic’s relationships are identified there is a liminal space between what the plastic was, what it is now, and what it will become. In this space how might I honor the natural materials this plastic was made from as well as the life it led as disposable packaging? How have I imposed meanings onto this plastic? How does regarding it as “bad” or “trash” color my relationship to the genius material through which so much of my life today is made possible? I believe that deep change is made possible when current reality is fully accepted. How might regarding this material with reverence expand my ability to accept and love reality and from there transform it? How can the way I relate to these objects and this material parallel the direction I’d like all my relationships to move in?
Design: With a new relationship being practiced, I am working closely with the plastic in an intuitive way as a medium for it to realize its own dreams. I believe that everything has its own dreams and desires. In many of the world’s oldest cultures all things, animate and inanimate, dream. In the ‘Dream Tending’ dream work approach dream images are regarded as alive, they have their own desires and make requests of us. I am here to listen and help this plastic realize its wildest (and most luxurious) dreams. So of course a material discarded and treated as cheap trash would dream of reincarnating as beautiful precious objects!
Production: Similar to the earth forming diamonds, I too use heat and pressure to remold these pieces of plastic “trash” into beautiful newness. I manipulate the melt plastic dough and “paint” with the colors. Metal is an important companion material that is playing a literal supportive role to the plastic works. Polyethylene really wants to have a duet with yellow gold. I make custom molds for this project and am employing the power of hydraulic presses! Metal settings are both lost wax cast and fabricated.