When Australian visual artist and teacher Shani Nottingham noticed the amount of bread wrappers her family was throwing away, she decided to use them in her work, to raise awareness about the environment and the importance of recycling.
She also reached out to her friends and family to send her their used bread tongs and as her project grew she was inundated with bread tags sent to her from all over the world.
Watch the video player above to see this amazing upcycled bread label art
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Shani joined The morning show from her home in Cowra and recalled how the project began with collecting discarded bread tongs and putting them in jars.
“I’m an artist and I love color, I started looking at these colors and thinking ‘they’re actually quite pretty, could I do something creative with these?’
“And I was wondering what other colors there were. So I did this thing where you go down that Google search hole and I started reading about how bad they were for the environment… very hard to recycle.
“I thought it was interesting, but not so great, I come from a family of environmentalists and people who care about the environment.
“When you’re lying in bed or driving around and you have those moments where ideas come together and I thought, wait a second, I could use my art to bring attention to how bad these plastics are at single use,” Shani mentioned.
After initially asking friends and family to help provide her with bread labels, Shani revealed that once her plea for more labels went viral, she now literally has some. million at home.
“I have a whole room in my house full of bread labels.
“I now get parcels (of labels) from all over the world, I probably receive several parcels every day…so far I have about 20 different countries sending me things, it’s really amazing “, she said.
Shani has already curated several exhibitions and is planning more installations for the coming year.
If you would like to send used bread labels to help him continue his work, you can post them to The Bread Tag Project, 30 Lachlan Street Cowra, NSW 2794.