This is not an oil spill.

Title: This is not an oil spill.

Artist: Carrie Schoenborn

Description of Work:

This is not an oil spill consists of several 9-inch square drawings. Each square depicts a different commonly used, oil-based consumer product drawn on white paper using waste oil. From the street, it appears to be a white checkerboard of graphic representations of ubiquitous oil-based objects. Upon entering the UICA (Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts), the light streaming through the windows will reveal the words “This is not an oil spill.” in the midst of each honey-yellow silhouetted object. As the drawings hang on the window, the oil slowly and silently spreads transforming each object portrayed into a mere spot of color, easily dismissible background to the words it surrounds. Left hanging even longer and the oil that had spread turns almost clear. The original image once again becomes visible reminding the viewer that even though the object had been forgotten, it still remains buried beneath the surface.

While the oil spill in the gulf opens our eyes to the dangers of off-shore drilling and the environmental degradation caused by such a catastrophe, it also opens a door for self-reflection on the reasons such drilling is necessary in the first place. This is not an oil spill is meant to serve as a catalyst for conversation and introspection on the “needs” of our oil-consuming culture.

Artist Statement Accompanying Work (Audio):

According to reports by PBS News Hour, the experts’ worst case scenario (representing the highest estimates) estimates that approximately 4.200.000 gallons of oil were leaked per day in the BP oil spill in the Gulf Coast. This outraged many Americans and rightly so. Few, however, stop to question why such drilling is necessary in the first place. The United States consumes 818,916,000 gallons of petroleum every day. That’s over 194 times more oil per day than the amount leaked in the BP spill.

Where does all that oil end up? Of the approximately 7.14 billion barrels of petroleum consumed by the U.S., over 126 billion gallons a year become gasoline and over 25 million gallons go to making petrochemical feedstock, which is used to make products such as plastic cups, cutlery and the many products shown here.

Many of these items are used once, or perhaps a few times, and then discarded for new or “better” items resulting in huge landfills, giant islands of floating garbage in the ocean and highways littered with trash. Oil isn’t just leaking from pipes into the ocean, its being sucked out, manipulated and discarded at incredible rates. *Page in progress. Please check back soon for links to useful information.*