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Video Highlights James Lake’s Cardboard Art Practice

British artist James Lake first began to use cardboard in his work after losing his leg to bone cancer 20 years ago, finding strength and versatility in this unlikely, yet readily available material. In a new video from Rajapack, Lake recalls his story and shows a bit of his process. Lake used Earth Overshoot Day as inspiration for a sculpture that "shows the size the earth would need to be to support the speed we are consuming the Earth’s resources. At the centre of the sculpture sits the Earth, and encasing half of it is a shell 1.7 times larger."

British artist James Lake first began to use cardboard in his work after losing his leg to bone cancer 20 years ago, finding strength and versatility in this unlikely, yet readily available material. In a new video from Rajapack, Lake recalls his story and shows a bit of his process. Lake used Earth Overshoot Day as inspiration for a sculpture that “shows the size the earth would need to be to support the speed we are consuming the Earth’s resources. At the centre of the sculpture sits the Earth, and encasing half of it is a shell 1.7 times larger.”

“What you do when you work with cardboard is you give it value by the time, the effort, and the care you put into it. And I think when we come to think about the planet’s resources, actually trying to find a new way to value things and people, it’s very, very important. I’d rather people valued that than value it because it’s made of marble.”


See more of the artist’s work below.

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