Dumped Bicycle Chains Made Into Chandeliers

One man’s scrap is another man’s art – or in this case another woman’s.

Carolina Fontoura Alzaga is worried that we’re becoming a throw-away society, dumping broken and old technology into the ground without questioning its impact on the environment. That’s ok in the short-term, but what happens when there are mountains upon mountains of rubbish dotted across the landscape?

To that end, she salvages discarded bicycle chains, transforming and connecting them to form these quite beautiful chandeliers. The series is called ‘CONNECT’ and it’s motivating factor is to…

“Addresses class codes, power dynamics and ecological responsibility. The traditional chandelier is seen as a bourgeois commodity, a cachet of affluence, excess, and as such power. The recycled bicycle parts become a representation of the dismissed, invisible, and powerless, but are also an affirmation of self-propelled movement. The bicycle chandelier thereby creates a new third meaning of reclaimed agency.”

Carolina  has also created a short-film to explain and showcase the interesting process behind her creations. It does a great job in highlighting her as a genuine individual seeking to make not only a statement but bring about a sense of change in the world.

You can purchase her work via her official Etsy shop.