Ghost Nets Collected From Maui Beaches Given New Life as Art

Ghost nets and other marine debris washing ashore on Maui are being given a new lease of life as artworks by local artist Michiko Smith.

Smith collects abandoned and lost fishing gear from Maui’s beaches and coastal waters, working with the Pacific Whale Foundation to recover nets, ropes, lines, pots, floats and other debris. One of the ghost nets she collected weighed around 280 pounds.

Ghost nets are fishing gear that has been lost or abandoned. In the Pacific, large nets can travel hundreds of miles before reaching Hawaii, where they can become tangled around rocks and coral reefs or wash up on beaches. Further offshore, they can also entangle marine animals including whales, turtles and dolphins.

Smith selects some of the recovered nets for her artwork, sorting them by their original colours rather than dyeing them. She washes and untangles the material before cutting it with a hot knife and arranging it into designs, often inspired by marine life or native Hawaiian plants.

She makes her own wooden frames and glues the pieces of netting into place. Individual works can take up to a month to complete.

Smith holds a degree in environmental science and has previously worked in coral reef restoration on Maui. She became a full-time artist earlier this year, using her work to highlight the marine environment and the problem of ocean debris.

Maui’s coastal waters and shorelines see between 15,000 and 20,000 pounds of abandoned or lost fishing gear and other large marine debris collected each year by organisations and volunteers. The material is taken to the Center for Marine Debris Research on Oʻahu, where it is studied and recycled where possible.

The research centre is also investigating ways to turn recovered ghost nets into useful products, including road paving material and plastic lumber, while continuing to study where marine debris comes from and how it affects Hawaii’s marine environment.

Follow Michiko on Instagram here: www.instagram.com/artbymichi.co/

Photo: Michiko Smith

Source: Maui Now