Recycled Artist in Residency (RAIR) is a unique partnership that highlights the intersection of socially engaged art and recycling. Working with Revolution Recovery—a recycling center which aims to keep as much construction job site materials out of landfills as possible, RAIR is an on-site space for artists. This allows RAIR to achieve several goals: (i) increasing artists’ access to materials; (ii) diverting more resources from the waste stream; and (iii) growing the public’s knowledge of sustainable practices. They have seen increasing demand for sourcing materials from the waste stream for use in projects in both public and private spaces such as office buildings and parks, as well as an increasing demand for planning, design and fabrication services that utilize waste materials to create design elements such as lighting and flooring. To support this emerging practice, RAIR will undergo a market analysis process to identify a sustainable path forward. Undertaking this step would be particularly timely because Revolutionary Recovery recently acquired additional land and will be expanding its operations, providing RAIR even more fodder for its work. Such an endeavor would be the next iteration of this unique early stage organization, which has the potential to serve as a model in this field of art and sustainability practices.
