A thought-provoking new installation by Liverpool Art Prize winner Robyn Woolston is recycling waste plastic into a striking environmental statement at the City's Walker Art Gallery.

Robyn has sourced nine giant bales of waste plastic from the Liverpool yard of the recycler Centriforce Products and positioned them in the sharply contrasting setting of the Walker's elegant and classic Victorian gallery.

The effect is intended to both confront and move the visitor to make new connections and conclusions about the way waste is valued against the backdrop of treasured cultural objects, and Robyn's personal experiences. By walking through and around the bales, visitors mirror the patterns directly above them of the ornate cornices and coving of the ceiling.

The one metre high bales a tightly packed and multi-coloured mixture of plastic bags and film - would normally have been destined for the production lines of Centriforce Products, the UK's largest independent recycler of plastic waste where it is made into Stokbord® recycled plastic board that has a wide range of end uses in agriculture, sport, leisure and civil engineering.

Managing Director Simon Carroll said: "As a Liverpool company committed to reducing the amount of plastic waste that goes to landfill or is exported, we were delighted to support Robyn on this project. Robyn is making a striking statement that will make many stop and think again about the issues surrounding plastics recycling."

Robyn was invited to mount the installation as winner of the 2012 Liverpool Art Prize. During a tour of the gallery and its stores she was drawn to the 1889 Strangers in a Strange Land painting of refugee children by Albert Starling and was struck by the parallels to her own work. The result is an artwork that explores the burden of inorganic waste and highlights our relationship with the Earth and its finite resources.

Robyn says: "Waste materials are abundantly available because of the way in which we consume. Strangers in a Strange Land offers a way to reassess the value of these materials so as to understand just how much we value their inherent possibilities."

Waste recycled into art makes a bold statement

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