Hollywood star and environmental campaigner Christine Baranski was on hand in the Donegal Gaeltacht today for the unveiling of a sculpture to highlight the issue of waste on our beaches.
In July, two local community groups came together to clean up their local beach and at the same time to highlight the waste issue.
The Leitir Mhic an Bhaird Development Group and the Gweebarra Community Group gathered up a huge amount of waste, much of it plastic, on Dumhaigh beach.
They handed it all over to Belfast-based artist Niamh McCann to put it to good use, essentially turning the waste into art.
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Since then workshops on waste have been held in the community with local children making their own art works out of waste and Niamh worked on a piece of sculpture from the waste gathered in July.
This afternoon, her installation sculpture was unveiled in Leitir Mhic an Bhaird by visiting American actress Christine Baranski of Mamma Mia and the Good Wife fame.
Niamh's sculpture is based on a mythical Irish sea bird Fand, killed by Cú Chulainn for her feathers, and Niamh said this is the perfect metaphor for the selfishness of man and how we take and take from nature and that there are repercussions for that.
An inscription on the plaque at the base of the sculpture reads: "Oceans can live without humans - but humans can't live without oceans."
Organiser Angela Apitius said the whole project was a great success and that now people are thinking about not just recycling plastic but avoiding using it altogether.
She added that other communities are following suit and getting involved in organising beach clean-ups and running workshops on waste.
