Aston Ebanks describes himself as a conceptual artist. He does not limit himself to any one medium or style. Although some of his most recent work includes two different bag designs that he makes from used materials, previous works have included mazes, picket fences and beach cabanas.
“Whatever inspires me at the time, that’s what I focus on,” he says.
Aston’s artistic journey started with photography, although he received no formal training in it, teaching himself through a process of trial and error. It was something he took up after moving from Cayman to Switzerland. “Not speaking the language I was forced to be more observant,” he recalls. “When you’re not involved in a conversation you can be more introspective.”
In recent years he has put his camera down, however, and much of his recent work focuses on recycling used materials, and finding different ways to make use of the many items and materials that are thrown away every day.
One of his bag designs – a shopping bag – is made from used chicken feed sacks. The other, a messenger bag, uses vinyl from banners that were once put up to advertise an event. His bags are now being sold in the retail corner of the National Gallery.
They say one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, and Aston is certainly exploring the adage in depth. Other materials that he find ways to recycle are shipping pallets and construction lumber.
“The biggest thing I’ve made is an 80 by 80 square maze,” he says. “I made it from used pallets, stacking them all up – but it was only up for a few months.”
Another project entailed building picket fences from scrap lumber – an idea that took shape when he was teaching the art outreach programme at the prison, something he has been doing for a couple of years now. It was a way to teach the guys in there a useful skill that they could use in the outside world, he says, as well as giving them the chance to find some artistic expression. When the man he had been working with was released from prison the two continued the project. “We would go to construction sites, collect the scrap lumber, remove the nails, clean it up, cut it into pickets and build fences. Eventually we donated the fences to houses on the Island. It was also a way of using materials that would otherwise become trash,” explains Aston.
Somewhere on the beach at Breakers there is a hidden cabana-type structure Aston built, using casuarina trees and other materials he found on the beach. It has a raised floor, a thatched roof and a little caboose, he says. None of the materials were purchased, it all came from bits and pieces he dragged down the beach.
What Aston’s next project will be depends on where inspiration comes from next, but let’s hope he sticks with his recycling theme – there can never be too many people on this Island looking for new ways to reduce, reuse and recycle.
Related Videos
