VOA标准英语2015--San Francisco Artists Make Art From Trash

San Francisco Artists Make Art From Trash

SAN FRANCSICO—

It is said that one person’s trash is another person’s treasure, and the idea helped inspire an program in San Francisco, where recycled materials are used to create works of art.

They work at a recycling center of a company called Recology, as part of an art program that the employee-owned firm started 25 years ago.  

As workers sift¹ the garbage in a massive warehouse², artist Ma Li is at work next door, shaping plastic bottles into hanging star bursts. She receives a stipend³ to spend four months on her project using articles culled⁴ from San Francisco’s trash.

Ingenious creation

The work features cardboard tubes, fabric⁵ and other material, activated⁶ by flowing air and dancers.

“In the end, it’s going to be a moving pneumatic sculpture that can be enacted⁷ by a group of participants. So it is going to be a group performance,” said Li.

She said she learned recycling from her parents while growing up in China in the 1980s, when the country was poorer and more thrifty⁸ than it is today.

San Francisco artist Michael Arcega works with recycled wood and old leather belts, all salvaged⁹ from the garbage.

“My project is based on pseudo-anthropological research on the Nacerima people,” he said.

'Wasteful¹⁰ culture'

Arcega explained that Nacirema is American spelled backwards¹¹, and his artwork, which look like a display in a museum of folk culture, documents what he calls the wasteful culture of the American people. But he said it is a challenge sifting¹² through the trash for raw material.

“Finding what is useful in the work and what is actually garbage,” he said.

A gallery in Los Angeles is displaying some of the art from the San Francisco project: collages¹³ made from old packaging, sculptures from scrap¹⁴ metal and carpenters’ saws whose blades have been cut to look like trees.

Program manager Deborah Munk explained how the art objects were made.

“Artists pull out every imaginable material you can think of, but mostly it is wood or metal or textiles that they use. Paint. We have had a lot of painters,” she said.

Los Angeles gallery owner Liz Gordon said artists have a history of recycling.

“People who did not have the resources to go out and be able to buy supplies found supplies and have been using found objects and assemblage for many, many years,” she said.

Recycling lifestyle

Li said these art works have a message.

“So everyone can come together to make a little change in their daily life and behavior to try to save the environment and resources,” she said.

The man who heads the recycling company, Mike Sangiacomo, hopes to see as much waste as possible reused.

“Along the way, if some of it is made into some fun pieces of art and draws people’s attention to the issue, we think it is a great way to do something that is good for our business, good for our community, good for society,” he said.

And the project shows how a little imagination can transform one person’s trash into another’s artwork.

1 sift   

v.筛撒，纷落，详察

参考例句：

• Sift out the wheat from the chaff.把小麦的壳筛出来。
• Sift sugar on top of the cake.在蛋糕上面撒上糖。

2 warehouse   

n.仓库；vt.存入仓库

参考例句：

• We freighted the goods to the warehouse by truck.我们用卡车把货物运到仓库。
• The manager wants to clear off the old stocks in the warehouse.经理想把仓库里积压的存货处理掉。

3 stipend   

n.薪贴；奖学金；养老金

参考例句：

• The company is going to ajust my stipend from this month onwards.从这一个月开始公司将对我的薪金作调整。
• This sum was nearly a third of his total stipend.这笔钱几乎是他全部津贴的三分之一。

4 culled   

v.挑选，剔除( cull的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The herd must be culled. 必须有选择地杀掉部分牧畜。 来自辞典例句
• The facts were culled from various sources. 这些事实是从各方收集到的。 来自辞典例句

5 fabric   

n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织

参考例句：

• The fabric will spot easily.这种织品很容易玷污。
• I don't like the pattern on the fabric.我不喜欢那块布料上的图案。

6 activated   

adj. 激活的 动词activate的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• The canister is filled with activated charcoal.蒸气回收罐中充满了活性炭。

7 enacted   

制定（法律），通过（法案）( enact的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• legislation enacted by parliament 由议会通过的法律
• Outside in the little lobby another scene was begin enacted. 外面的小休息室里又是另一番景象。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

8 thrifty   

adj.节俭的；兴旺的；健壮的

参考例句：

• Except for smoking and drinking,he is a thrifty man.除了抽烟、喝酒，他是个生活节俭的人。
• She was a thrifty woman and managed to put aside some money every month.她是个很会持家的妇女，每月都设法存些钱。

9 salvaged   

（从火灾、海难等中）抢救（某物）( salvage的过去式和过去分词 )； 回收利用（某物）

参考例句：

• The investigators studied flight recorders salvaged from the wreckage. 调查者研究了从飞机残骸中找到的黑匣子。
• The team's first task was to decide what equipment could be salvaged. 该队的首要任务是决定可以抢救哪些设备。

10 wasteful   

adj.（造成）浪费的，挥霍的

参考例句：

• It is a shame to be so wasteful.这样浪费太可惜了。
• Duties have been reassigned to avoid wasteful duplication of work.为避免重复劳动浪费资源，任务已经重新分派。

11 backwards   

adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地

参考例句：

• He turned on the light and began to pace backwards and forwards.他打开电灯并开始走来走去。
• All the girls fell over backwards to get the party ready.姑娘们迫不及待地为聚会做准备。

12 sifting   

n.筛，过滤v.筛( sift的现在分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审

参考例句：

• He lay on the beach, sifting the sand through his fingers. 他躺在沙滩上用手筛砂子玩。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I was sifting the cinders when she came in. 她进来时，我正在筛煤渣。 来自辞典例句

13 collages   

n.拼贴画( collage的名词复数 )；杂烩

参考例句：

• My work includes mixed media, paintings and digital collages. 我的工作包括混合媒介，绘画和数码拼贴。 来自互联网
• I love making photo collages. 我喜欢做照片拼贴。 来自互联网

14 scrap   

n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废

参考例句：

• A man comes round regularly collecting scrap.有个男人定时来收废品。
• Sell that car for scrap.把那辆汽车当残品卖了吧。