Collage: Steve Jobs

"Steve Jobs" by Jason Mecier

Jason Mecier created this portrait of tech giant Steve Jobs from twenty pounds of what he's characterizing as "e-waste," including bits of cell phones, headphones, iPods, keyboards, memory sticks, and other upcycled trash from Apple.  It took Mecier over forty hours to assemble the pieces.

Sculpture: PlayStation Tumblr

Batman Tumbler of Recycled PlayStation 2 Consoles by Daniel Shankalonian

Sculpture available for purchase from Etsy. US$250

Daniel Shankalonian took a bunch of broken PlayStation 2 consoles (along with other various hardware parts from computers and printers) and created this amazing handmade replica of Batman’s Tumbler vehicle from the Batman films. It’s currently being sold online, should you find yourself in need of a unique piece of art.

Sculpture: C3PO

C3PO "Woody" by Gabriel Dishaw

Available for purchase from the artist's website. US$799.99

"My passion for Star Wars and one of the most iconic robots of all time has carried over to my upcycled art. C3PO "Woody" was created using recycled materials from computer parts, adding machines, calulators, check printers and typewriters"

Sculpture: Bennett Robots

"Delta 2"

Bennett Robots by Gordon Bennett

Project: The Boneyard

The Boneyard Project: Art on Abandoned Airplanes
At the Pima Air & Space Museum in Tucson, Arizona.

“The Boneyard Project” is an art exhibition of scrapped military aircraft that have been repurposed as canvases for contemporary artists. The project involves making of decorative paintings and graffiti on the fuselage of World War II era military aircrafts that lie abandoned in the infamous “Boneyard” in Arizona desert, the USA. The idea of The Boneyard Project was first conceived by Eric Firestone and organized by curator Carlo McCormick in the spring of 2010. Firestone’s concept has since evolved into a larger goal in which various international contemporary artists are set to redesign the entirety of old, out-of-use military planes.

Portrait: Trash Portraits

Portraits Formed From Leftover Trash by Zac Freeman

American artist Zac Freeman creates mosaic-style portraits from upcycled garbage. Specifically, he's chosen trash that is leftover from the items we regularly consume, including colored bottle caps, buttons, and soda can tabs.

Sculpture: R³BOT

"R³BOT" by Portuguese artist Marco Fernandes

Quick Pic: Scap Millennium Falcon

Millennium Falcon Made from Car Parts

Source: Ripley's Odditorium in the USA's Williamsburg, Virginia

This "piece of junk" is over three metres long and weighs over 400kg.

Sculpture: Small Key Ball

Small Key Ball Sculpture by Moerkey

Available for purchase at Etsy. US$95

I can honestly say I’ve never seen anything like this before. It comes with a small red gum timber ring so you can easily display it. The shop also has other items made from keys, reclaimed copper pipe, wire, and coins… including a key cube that reminds me both of the puzzle box from Hellraiser and the Borg cube from Star Trek.

“This small ball is made from over 50 individually curved keys, including one skeleton key, hand pieced together to form a polished metal sphere.”

Photography: 12LVE

"12LVE" by Michael Tompert

Photographed by Paul Fairchild

On exhibit at the small Live Worms Gallery in San Francisco, California

Is it art or metal illness? You decide.

Michael Tompert, San Francisco-area graphic designer with Raygun Studio, takes new Apple products and wrecks them in order to photograph the results.  His means are varied.  He has used blowtorches, sledgehammers, handsaws, and handguns, but the results are always the same.  Complete obliteration.

Video: The Boneyard Project

The Boneyard Project: Return Flight by Jason Wawro

It’s always great to see used objects get a second life. It’s even better when that second life involves them being transformed into a giant canvas. The Boneyard Project is a project conceived by Eric Firestone aimed salvaging airplanes from America’s military history for artists breath new life into.  Check out photos of the results of the project at the Huffington Post.

Installation: Vapor Slide

Vapor Slide by Korean artist Soo Sunny Park

This installation was exhibited in South Strafford, Vermont in 2007.  It was constructed of  found/recycled materials, including brazed chain link fence, plastic cups, paper clips, river rocks, cotton strings, iron oxide, latex paint, and artificial light.  It's rather expansive dimensions are 9’10” x 23’ x 42’.

Sculpture: Custom Metalwork

Custom Sculptures by Tom Samui

Tom Samui from Switzerland makes these custom sculptures out of recycled car and motorcycle parts. He and his team have been perfecting these sculptures over the last ten years. Once a month they go to a junk yard and cart away a truckload of old car and motorcycle parts. The pieces are cleaned and sorted by type; nothing is thrown away. All pieces are welded together, polished and varnished with special anti-rust lacquer. It takes about 400 hours of work to complete a large sculpture. The details and the quality of the work can be seen especially on the deer and the American Indian on the horse by clicking on the images (below).

Whether you have a drawing, a photo, a model, an idea; he can make almost any object in any size between 3 feet (1 meter) and 26 feet (8 meters). If the sculpture is smaller than 3 feet (1 meter) the minimum order is 20 pieces. The larger pieces can be taken apart into up to 10 pieces and can be transported to almost anywhere in the world. Production time for custom pieces is two to three months.