Pam Longobardi: Reworlding

2017, Exhibition Catalogue by Celina Jeffery, Hathaway Contemporary Gallery

Abstract

Reworlding – the title of this retrospective by Pam Longobardi, comprises of plastic assemblages, installations and digital photographs which have been initiated by the identification, collation and reworking of oceanic plastic. Longobardi’s work investigates the ubiquity of plastic contamination within the world’s oceans. Longobardi initiates beach community clean-ups and international expeditions to identify and gather oceanic plastics that she then re-contextualizes in gallery spaces. In this exhibition, she transforms these prosaic forms into compelling installations that query the effects global capitalism, specifically its cultures of discard and waste, upon the composition of human and aquatic life. Her installations bring attention to the abundance and mobility of marine plastic, commenting on own relational interactions with plastic consumption and ocean life. This exhibition also includes a body of work that investigates the life jacket as a symbol of the current refugee crises, particularly in Lesvos, Greece, where the artist has spent several years engaging in community projects. Reworlding offers a glimpse of Longobardi’s feminist political imaginary – an imaginary that provides a vision of the ocean laden with plastic and invites us to consider how and in what manner can we live in an oceanic way?