The artist Maria Cristina Finucci’s “state of plastic” celebrates its first year with the installation “The Wave” in the square of MAXXI in Rome and the opening of its first embassy, which was developed in collaboration with the Master in Exhibit & Public Design at “Sapienza” University of Rome, through the exhibition “6 embassies of the Garbage Patch State.” The projects were realized with Cecilia Cecchini, the director of the Master and curator of the exhibition, along with the Master’s instructors: Marco Bevilacqua, Bianca Elena Patroni Griffi (for the setup), Adriano Caputo (for the lighting design), Emily Auriemma (for the three-dimensional representation), Salvatore Iaconesi and Oriana Persico (for multimedia communication), and with Stefania Vannini, head of the Education Department at MAXXI, architect Alessandro d’Onofrio, and artist Maria Cristina Finucci. The public space project and the use of multimedia communication were fundamental to the work of 12 students who collaborated in pairs: Maria Olga Baracos, Lorraine Sanabria Isabel Baez, Roberta Di Vilio, Kandy Llamoca Inga Jesus, Blessed Magrini, Martina Malfatti, Anthony Marinelli, Marco Morosetti, Melike Sanli, Ilaria Savarese, Mariarosaria Sidonians, and Carla Mireille Silva Felices. “The work, which combines design, architecture, and multimedia communication, aims to bring visibility to an invisible phenomenon that is unknown to most,” says Cecilia Cecchini, “to raise public awareness, particularly among children with whom the Education Department at MAXXI works, about the need for conscious use of objects, without demonizing plastic, which is an essential resource for contemporary society, but by promoting sustainable disposal.” The issue of marine pollution is addressed from a divulgative and educational perspective, and each project has provided an interpretation of the embassy of that imaginary state, simultaneously so real in its destructive action. The theme of the project is also connected to digital cultures: the parallelism between the state and the digital Garbage Patch is evident in its ability to transcend cultures, nationalities, and geographies, creating something fundamentally new and unexpected.

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