Francesca Busca

About

Eco-artivist, Trashure Artist, Waste Mosaicist. Using art as a tool for empathy towards all life and as a catalyst for systemic change.

Statement

I am an eco‑artivist whose practice is rooted in a simple but radical premise: waste is a cultural construct. We decide what is precious and what is worthless — and those decisions shape our world. By transforming discarded materials into mosaics, I challenge those assumptions and invite viewers to reconsider value, responsibility and our relationship with the living systems that sustain us. My medium is trashure: the waste we generate, the remnants we overlook, the fragments we abandon. I choose it deliberately — not only to avoid plundering Mother Earth any further, but to expose the contradictions embedded in our habits of consumption. Each artwork is built from what already exists: ghost gear, fruit nets, cork, medicine vials, industrial remnants, domestic scraps. Some materials take years to gather; others arrive unexpectedly, gifted by the local and global communities who now support my practice. This resourceful, intuitive, adaptive process mirrors the ecological truth that everything is interconnected and constantly shifting. A significant part of my practice is currently shaped by my role in Project One Wave, led by the Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK — a marine conservation network dedicated to defending ocean wildlife through direct action, community engagement and the recovery of harmful marine debris. Through our missions, we retrieve ghost gear and marine‑industry waste that I later transform into artworks. This collaboration grounds my practice in real‑world ecological repair: the materials I use are not symbolic, but literal evidence of the crisis we are trying to solve. But the material is only the doorway. My deeper aim is to spark empathy for the entire ecosystem — its species, its flora, its fauna, its fragile interdependencies. I want to help shift mentalities from an anthropocentric worldview to a holistic one, centred on the common good of the whole living system. Abstraction plays a key role in this: shapes, colours and textures bypass intellectual filters and speak directly to instinct, allowing viewers to feel before they analyse, to connect before they categorise. My practice extends beyond the studio into interdisciplinary collaboration. Working with institutions such as the institute of Marine Sciences (CNR‑ISMAR) in Venice, the University of Birmingham Business School, and the London Transport Museum allows me to weave scientific insight, behavioural research and public engagement into the work. Environmental change is never just aesthetic; it is cultural, relational and systemic. Art becomes both subject and vessel — developing empathy while communicating and humanising complex ideas. This ethos also drives GREENy bastARTs, the eco‑artivist collective I founded to bring artists, scientists, activists and communities into the same conversation. Our flagship project, Kindfire, is the artistic heart of London Climate Action Week: a ten‑day exhibition with panels, workshops, performances and climate‑action sessions designed to empower people and build cross‑sector collaboration. Art opens the path to dialogue; the events offer tangible ways to act. I believe art is not just relevant — it is fundamental to a healthy society. In a world overflowing with information yet starved of meaning, art remains our closest thing to a universal language. It bypasses defences, builds empathy, and makes systemic change emotionally accessible. It turns abstract ideas into lived experience. My work is guided by integrity and coherence. I struggle with art that is purely decorative, environmentally contradictory, or elevated to the status of an untouchable object. For me, art is a vessel for connection — the first line of a conversation, not the end point. It must serve the common good, not reinforce systems of inequality or distraction. Looking ahead, I hope my eco‑artivism — and the community around it — will have contributed to a systemic shift: a culture where value is measured by ecological repair and contributions to life on Earth, where the arts are recognised as a universal language for unity and education, and where cognitive dissonance is a thing of the past.

Exhibitions

Recognition

Commissions

ArtforTrash: making artworks using client's waste. Anything which can be done with minimum carbon footprint, ethical and vegan