POWERHOUSE COLLECTION

'End Cycle' memorial gravestone and urn

Object No. 2020/136/1

‘We wanted to look at not only the end-of-cycle for products, in this case garments, but at the end of the human lifecycle itself.’ Nick Karlovasitis ‘We envisage a time when microfactories will enable communities to create closed-loop circuits for recycling their own materials in small batches for local usage.’ Veena Sahajwalla End Cycle explores the concept of death, the accumulation of worldly possessions and the implications for those left behind in an increasingly densely populated society. This gravestone is made from discarded fabric, which has been transformed in the Centre for Sustainable Materials Research and Technology (SMaRT) at the University of NSW (UNSW). By reducing consumption at the end of our lives and developing products from artefacts left by people who have died, End Cycle performs an environmental service and allows stories of the dead to live on via embedded Near-Field Communication (NFC) chips. Sarah Gibson and Nick Karlovasitis are graduates of the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). Their studio GibsonKarlo creates furniture, lighting and accessories characterised by clean, bold silhouettes and a savvy use of recycled materials. They also commission fellow designers to create accessible pieces under the brand DesignByThem. Australian Research Council Laureate Professor Veena Sahajwalla is the Founding Director of the SMaRT Centre at UNSW, where she also leads the Microfactorie®. This work was commissioned by the Powerhouse for display in the exhibition "Hybrid: Objects for Future Homes", held from 12 September 2020 - 28 February 2021. Recognising environmental challenges and mounting health and social concerns, the Powerhouse commissioned nine design studios to create objects for the future home. Asked to respond to climate data and demographic predictions for the year 2030, these studios collaborated with researchers and practitioners from diverse industries. The commissions, which included this “End Cycle” memorial, offer an insight into our domestic futures, and challenge established design methodologies with a cross-disciplinary, hybrid approach. Kristina Stankovski and Keinton Butler, 2020