Speaking of Beauty . . .

Art-E-Fact
"a portion of the 100,000 cigarette butts collected in downtown San Rafael"
Marinscope Community Newspapers
Text and Photo by Gregory Andersen
Novato, California

As readers know, I've been speaking of beauty lately, and my old Berkeley friend Carla Koop is still a beauty. But since she's not artificial, she cannot be considered art. The art is to her left, but I don't know that I'd call it beautiful even though it qualifies as art, given that it's made by artists:

Three months after its installation, a public art piece called a "cigarette eater meter" has collected 50,000 cigarette butts and in turn raised money for a local nonprofit.

The 7-foot-tall meter was placed in the San Rafael city plaza on Fourth Street on May 30 as part of an effort by the San Rafael Clean Coalition to get litter off city streets. The coalition, a group of organizations and volunteers focused on keeping the city tidy, wants people to retrain themselves not to throw cigarette leftovers on the ground. (Megan Hansen, "Cigarette eater meter in San Rafael collects 50,000 cigarette butts," Marin Independent Journal, August 28, 2013)

Form follows function in this case, I reckon. The cause is a good one. As of August 28th, they had "just hit the halfway point," according to Carla, as quoted by Megan Hansen, but by October 7th, they'd reached their goal of 100,000 butts, as the above photo by Gregory Andersen indicates.

What next? A cigarette eater meter on every square in every town?