The Plastocene Imaginary

Frederik De Wilde’s artwork, titled Plastocene Soup emerges as a compelling artifact within the discourse of contemporary art, offering a critical lens on the speculative futures of the Plastocene—a term coined to describe the current geological epoch dominated by plastic proliferation. This piece, characterized by its iridescent, amorphous composition and subtle hues of white, black, purple, and gray, evokes a visceral engagement with the post-natural and post-evolutionary implications of human-induced environmental transformation. Situated at the intersection of the Anthropocene and the Plastocene, De Wilde’s work invites a rigorous examination of humanity’s legacy, drawing on theoretical frameworks from Donna Haraway’s Staying with the Trouble (2016) and Timothy Morton’s Hyperobjects (2013), while reflecting on the ecological and ontological shifts precipitated by plastic pollution.

The image presents a fluid, almost cellular landscape, its surface rippling with organic-inorganic hybridity. The glistening textures and fragmented forms suggest a material world where plastic, once a synthetic innovation, has become a pervasive ecological actor. This aligns with the Plastocene narrative, wherein an estimated 12 million tonnes of plastic enter the oceans annually, with projections indicating that plastic mass may surpass that of marine life by 2050 (UN Environment Programme, 2018). De Wilde’s composition mirrors this statistic-driven apocalypse, transforming the aesthetic into a speculative topography of the ocean floor, where microplastics and nanoplastics settle as enduring sediments. The work’s iridescence—evoking the sheen of floating debris in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a vortex four and a half times the size of Germany—serves as a visual metaphor for the indestructibility of plastic, a material designed to resist decay yet now reconfiguring the biosphere (Lebreton et al., 2018).

The connection to the Anthropocene is inescapable, as this epoch is defined by human activity’s indelible imprint on Earth’s systems. De Wilde’s Plastocene Soup extends this narrative into a post-natural realm, where the boundaries between the organic and the synthetic dissolve. The Anthropocene, as articulated by Crutzen and Stoermer (2000), marks humanity’s ascendancy as a geological force; however, the Plastocene reframes this dominance as a paradox of creation and neglect, encapsulated in the adage “out of sight, out of mind.” The artist’s use of a fluid, almost biological aesthetic critiques this disavowal, suggesting a post-evolutionary future where plastic becomes a co-evolutionary partner. This resonates with Haraway’s concept of the Chthulucene, a multispecies epoch that challenges anthropocentric hubris by embracing symbiotic entanglements with non-human agents, including the pervasive plastic particles now embedded in marine ecosystems (Haraway, 2016).

Moreover, the work’s post-evolutionary implications are profound. The amorphous forms hint at a speculative biology, where life adapts to or emerges from the plastocene milieu. This aligns with Morton’s notion of hyperobjects—entities so vast and distributed that they defy traditional comprehension—such as the global dispersal of microplastics from pole to pole (Morton, 2013). De Wilde’s art thus becomes a speculative archive, preserving the traces of a world where human artifacts outlive their creators, settling into the ocean depths as a new stratigraphic layer. The subtle purple accents may symbolize the toxic leaching of plastic additives, a reminder of the chemical legacy that permeates food chains and human bodies alike.

Critically, however, this aestheticization of the Plastocene raises ethical questions. By rendering plastic pollution as a shimmering, almost beautiful entity, De Wilde risks romanticizing a crisis that disproportionately affects marginalized coastal communities and marine biodiversity. The work’s abstraction may obscure the visceral realities of plastic ingestion by marine life and the socioeconomic disparities in waste management, echoing the Anthropocene’s uneven distribution of ecological burden (Nixon, 2011). This tension positions Plastocene Soup as both a lament and a provocation, urging viewers to confront the aesthetic allure of their own destruction.

Plastocene Soup stands as a sophisticated meditation on the speculative futures of the Plastocene. Through its phantasmagoric interplay of form and material, the work challenges us to reimagine humanity’s relationship with its synthetic progeny. As plastic continues to reshape the Earth, De Wilde’s art serves as a critical mirror, reflecting the beauty and horror of a world we have irrevocably altered.

References

• Crutzen, P. J., & Stoermer, E. F. (2000). The Anthropocene. Global Change Newsletter, 41, 17-18.
• Haraway, D. (2016). Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene. Duke University Press.
• Lebreton, L., Slat, B., et al. (2018). Evidence that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is rapidly accumulating plastic. Scientific Reports, 8, 4666.
• Morton, T. (2013). Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology after the End of the World. University of Minnesota Press.
• Nixon, R. (2011). Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor. Harvard University Press.
• UN Environment Programme. (2018). Single-Use Plastics: A Roadmap for Sustainability.