What if plastic became the beginning of a story instead of the end?

There is something fascinating about the moment when an object loses its original purpose.

A plastic bottle becomes a sculpture.

A fishing net becomes a woven surface.

Creative concept & execution by Leal Pereira • @lealpereirastudios

A handful of plastic collected on the beach becomes the starting point for a conversation between artists, young people and local communities.

Results of the Sustainable Craft Lab at Porto Santo School

For us, this is where eco creativity begins.

That is why we are excited to announce that ARTE.M Association and ARTHub Madeira are joining PLASTY – PLAStic-to-Treasure: Youth Labs for Creative Reuse and Zero Waste, a new Erasmus+ cooperation project bringing together partners from Portugal, Italy, Greece and Türkiye.

Although the project focuses on the creative reuse of plastic, its real subject is much broader.

PLASTY is about collaboration.

It is about learning across borders. It is about discovering how contemporary art, craft, design and non-formal education can work together to rethink the relationship between people, materials and the environment.

Throughout the project we will organise webinars, learning sessions, creative workshops and international exchanges, including a training mobility in Italy.

At the same time, we want to use this project to strengthen connections here at home.

Over the coming months we will begin building a growing community of young artists, makers, craftspeople, designers, educators and creative practitioners from Madeira and Porto Santo, creating opportunities to meet, exchange ideas and develop future collaborations around sustainability and contemporary creativity.

In many ways, PLASTY feels like a natural continuation of a journey we have already started.

For several years ARTE.M has been exploring how artistic practice can change the way we see discarded materials—not simply by recycling them, but by giving them new cultural meaning.

Together with local communities we have organised creative workshops dedicated to the artistic reuse of plastic, inviting participants to experiment with materials that would otherwise be forgotten.

During one of our youth exchanges on Porto Santo, we collaborated with Escola Básica e Secundária de Porto Santo and the wonderful artist and craft educator Dalília Peixe to create a large-scale fish sculpture from collected plastic waste and marine debris. The installation, later exhibited in the Porto Santo Municipal Building, became a reminder that environmental challenges can also become opportunities for creativity, dialogue and collective action.

Creative reuse has also been present in the work of our friend and collaborator Leal Pereira, whose contemporary installations built from discarded materials demonstrate how waste can become a powerful artistic language rather than simply a problem to solve.

And every year, our environmental actions continue beyond the studio. Beach clean-ups have become part of our programme not simply because coastlines need care, but because they invite people to experience their landscape differently. Our next community beach clean-up is already planned for November 2026, and we hope even more people will join us.

This is exactly what PLASTY represents.

Over the next two years we invite young people, artists, designers, craftspeople and anyone curious about creative experimentation to become part of this growing European network.

If you would like to receive information about upcoming workshops, webinars, international opportunities or simply become part of our creative community, we would love to hear from you.

📩 connect@artmadeira.org

The project PLASTY – PLAStic-to-Treasure: Youth Labs for Creative Reuse and Zero Waste is co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme and brings together organisations from Portugal, Italy, Greece and Türkiye to explore how creativity, collaboration and artistic experimentation can inspire more sustainable futures.