Sustainability in Resin Art
Inside my studio where sustainable resin work begins — every process, material, and decision made with care for both craft and planet.
Learning to Work With an Imperfect Material
Resin presents a contradiction within my practice.
I am drawn to what the material allows me to do with light, depth, color, containment, and form. At the same time, resin is a synthetic material with environmental and health consequences that cannot simply be dismissed because the finished artwork is beautiful. Learning to live with that contradiction has changed the way I work. When I first began using resin, many of the materials available to me were petroleum-based products developed primarily for industrial applications. I found the chemistry fascinating, but I also began questioning what it meant to deliberately bring those materials into my studio. That curiosity eventually led me somewhere unexpected: amber.
Amber is fossilized tree resin and, thanks partly to a certain mosquito in Jurassic Park, probably one of the most recognizable natural resins in popular culture. I wasn't going to start making sculpture from amber, but the connection prompted a larger question. If resin existed naturally, what alternatives were being developed from renewable biological sources?
I started researching.
That search eventually introduced me to bio-based resins and began a much longer process of testing different formulations against my work's requirements. A resin has to do more than carry an environmental claim. It has to behave correctly for the particular artwork, remain structurally stable, interact appropriately with pigments and other materials, and endure over time. So far, no single resin meets all those requirements, and no resin is harmless.
Safety is central to my sustainable practice — working responsibly with resin means protecting both my health and the environment.
Changing the source of some of a material's ingredients does not eliminate the precautions required to work with it or erase its environmental impact. Resin still demands careful handling, protective equipment, controlled processes, and consideration of what happens to material that does not become part of a finished artwork. That realization shifted my attention beyond simply choosing a different container from a supplier. I began looking more closely at the entire process.
Leftover pours could become test pieces rather than waste. Failed experiments could sometimes become material for later work. I could collect and reuse small remnants. Even the dust created through sanding became something I began thinking about as material rather than something automatically destined for disposal. Failure also became useful information. A material that performed poorly could tell me as much about what I needed from resin as one that worked. Over time, sustainability became less about finding an “eco-friendly resin” and more about developing a responsible relationship with an inherently imperfect material.
That distinction still matters to me.
I still research new formulations and processes. I still question manufacturers' environmental claims and look for the information behind them. I continue looking for ways to incorporate reclaimed, recycled, locally sourced, and end-of-life materials into the work where they make sense. The answers change as materials technology changes and as my own practice develops. What has remained consistent is the question underneath all of it:
Surplus pours and experiments are repurposed into miniature works — turning process leftovers into meaningful, zero-waste art.
What does it mean to choose a material knowingly?
For me, responsibility does not begin with pretending that an artwork has no impact. It begins with understanding the materials as fully as I can, acknowledging their limitations, reducing unnecessary waste, and continuing to question whether there is a better way to make the work without compromising what the work needs to become.
That process is unfinished.
I expect it always will be.
