Ultimate in recycling... artist to roll out sculpture made from dismantled bikes

DISMANTLED bicycle wrecks are unlikely to inspire most people searching for artistic expression.

But for a veteran Dutch visual artist they were just the job. Jan Eric Visser, whose work has been exhibited around the world, is no stranger to using waste to fuel his imagination – he has made a whole career out of it. For 23 years he has been transforming his household refuse into works of art.

He is working on his new project in a factory in Cayton, near Scarborough. The sculpture, now under construction at Econoplas Ltd, will consist exclusively of waste.

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And soon it will be heading for Rotterdam where it will be placed on permanent display beside a motorway to be viewed by more than 25,000 passing motorists every day.

As well as dismantled bicycle wrecks, Mr Visser also wished to integrate solar energy into his creation, to fuel a hydroponic two-part fertilizer system that will feed plants growing on parts of the sculpture.

The Aquadyne material is highly porous and enables the vegetation to take root. The artist, however, claims that his sculptures are not created merely by chance.

He said: “When you really connect with a material and work repetitively, you get into a state of deeper concentration, which perhaps is almost a meditative state.

“That’s when the material will tell you what to do next.”

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