Students’ eco-art installation highlights bottled water consumption

Used water bottles found new life as a compelling eco-art installation created by Honors College students taking Inhabiting Other Lives, a year-long course that gets students thinking about societal problems and encourages them to contribute to conversations and solutions surrounding those challenges. In this instance, the installation was designed to bring attention to the world’s bottled water consumption.

Built by the students on Earth Day 2011, the installation near the Green Library at Modesto A. Maidique Campus used empty water bottles collected on campus and from the students’ homes, with minimal use of fishing line and tape to help support the structure. The students were going to dismantle the project — and recycle it — the last day of finals.

“I basically designed a Lego structure,” said Gabriela Sanchez, an architecture major and member of the class. “The point of the whole installation is for the audience to go through a journey. Af first you’re like, wow, what a cool water bottle structure. At the end you need to become conscious about the topic we’re speaking about.”

Posters about bottled water and our consumption of it surrounded the installation. According to the Clean Air Council for U.S. Citizens, 2.5 million plastic bottles are trashed every hour in the United States. It takes millions of barrels of oil to produce and deliver all those bottles annually. The vast majority of them (estimates range from 75 to 80 percent) end up in landfills even though recycling programs exist. All this despite the fact that tap water typically surpasses all federal and state health standards.

The idea for the project came after the class watched Flow, an award-winning documentary by Irina Salina that builds a case against the growing privatization of the world’s dwindling fresh water supply.

“This class really opened our eyes to what’s going on around us,” said sophomore Cristina Poschl. “I don’t think any of us realized the impact that one bottle of water has on the world.”

A number of students in the class said they have stopped drinking bottled water as a result of what they learned in class. When asked what people can do to effect change, student Joseph Montes de Oca said it’s simple. “Use tap water and switch to stainless steel containers.”

Said Jose Vilanova, one of three teachers who team-taught the course, after experiencing the installation, “I am just so totally thrilled at the final output and all their work. They’re brilliant and inspiring and it’s been such an honor to lead them along this year-long journey.”

The students, who received help from FIU’s Office of University Sustainability in collecting bottles for the project, said the effort was definitely worth it.

“We spent a lot of time on this project,” said sophomore Cristina Poschl, “but I think we’ve gone in the last year from being a dysfunctional, cool family to one that really works together.”