LESS WASTE: MORE ART The Artist Fundraising Challenge

Each year, the fundraising artist challenge invites artists to step sideways from their usual practice — to experiment, improvise and respond to a shared constraint. This year’s theme, LESS WASTE: More Art, did just that, asking artists to reconsider materials, value, and the quiet stories embedded in what we discard.  

Juliana Austen's recreated Wind Chime

At the heart of the challenge is a simple but provocative premise: every artwork is sold at a fixed price of $50. That price becomes part of the artwork itself — prompting artists and viewers alike to reflect on the value of creativity, time, skill, and imagination, regardless of the materials used.

In September, artists were given rare after-hours access to Less Waste, the Snells Beach recycling organisation, opening the doors for an evening of fossicking. What followed was part treasure hunt, part memory lane, and part philosophical inquiry.

For Juliana Austen, the experience stirred deep nostalgia. The visit to Less Waste transported her back to childhood trips to “The Tip” — a place both thrilling and unsettling, where scavenging felt slightly illicit and possibility lay buried beneath piles of refuse. Less Waste, she notes, is a far more civilised version of that world, with its orderly rows of recycling bays — but the spirit of discovery remains.

Juliana’s find, an old metal fireside brush with worn bristles, became the starting point for a delicate transformation. Combined with other broken and discarded fragments, it was cleaned, assembled, and suspended into a quietly poetic wind chime — an artwork shaped as much by memory and play as by material.

Rosie Leat’s contribution reaches further back into questions she has carried for years. A country girl and a nurse by profession, Rosie once worked as a tradie’s assistant on rural building sites, where she became fascinated by leftover bits and pieces — overlooked fragments that others dismissed as rubbish. At art school, she was already grappling with ideas of process, materiality, and whether placing a material in a gallery context could elevate its meaning.

Rosie Leat's "That Time of the Month"

Her $50 challenge work, That Time of the Month, draws directly from those questions. Rosie reflects on a thought experiment that still resonates: If I were broke and homeless, how would I make art? Could found materials still carry meaning? Would they be seen as art, or simply as waste? Would they be seen differently if placed on a wall, lifted into a frame, or given space and attention? The throwaway fragments she incorporates are layered with personal memory and experience — and the work continues her ongoing exploration of where value truly resides.

Across the challenge, artists embraced these same questions in diverse and imaginative ways. Some found the theme a natural extension of their existing practice; others relished the opportunity to work completely outside familiar mediums. What united them was a sense of freedom — and the pleasure of making something meaningful from what already exists.

The LESS WASTE: More Art challenge is ultimately about more than recycling materials. It is about reframing perception: of waste, of worth, and of creativity itself. In turning discarded objects into artworks, artists remind us that value is not fixed — it is made, negotiated, and continually reimagined.

Video Contributors:

• Yvonne Gray – An upcycled pot transformed with buttons and baubles into a bold, eye-catching planter. (Red Button Pot Planter)

• Daniela Rubi (Phoenix Worx Ltd) – Smoothed salvaged wood and copper wire woven into a tactile, minimalist form.

• Derek Ventling – A rusted hand saw reborn as an owl-inspired outdoor sculpture, all materials sourced at Less Waste.

• Glenda Hopkins – A broken veneer lamp given new life with retro flair. Groovy! 

• Joy Zaloum – A rusty lampshade transformed into a sculptural candlestick holder.

• Juliana Austen - Bright and vibrant clay Nasturtiums' climb out from an old disused wooden picture frame as they often cover and fill waste ground.

• Julia Fraser – Painting on found corrugated iron, continuing her exploration of surface and reclaimed materials.

• Monique Ziegler – A glassless frame and a rescued pastel work allowing the image to spill beyond its boundaries.

• Cecilia Davison (Ceci's Clay Art) - Reimagining a classic balloon made from recycled aluminium can tiles.