In the news: Chemical regulation, pesticide ingredients, and healthy art

Posted on Oct 07, 2009 by Susie Collins in Blog, Media/Videos, News, Susie Collins

JS Online reports the EPA director backs tougher regulation of chemicals. The summit where Lisa Jackson spoke was a highly unusual gathering, called by the American Chemistry Council, the lobby group for the chemical industry, and the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group that frequently criticizes industry’s lack of disclosure. Those groups typically are at odds over how much information and testing needs to be done.

Beyond Pesticides reports EPA Seeks to Disclose Hazardous Pesticide Inert Ingredients. What the heck have they been waiting for? Let’s see how nuts people think we are now.

Green Train announces Hollywood charity and Inku Artist McKenzie, who was stricken with a devastating environmental illness thought by doctors to be triggered by years of exposure to toxic materials in the art creating process. This sickness inspired and propelled McKenzie life-changing mission to discover and create an innovative way to produce healthy, earth-sensitive fine art and prints, which she calls Inku Art.

Dr. Weil reports on a study in China conducted by Australian researchers showing that women who ate the most fresh button mushrooms, 10 grams or more per day, were about two-thirds less likely to develop breast cancer than women who ate no mushrooms.

Start-Up Nation is a website that housebound canaries might like to peruse for ideas about home-based businesses.

Two products came to my attention this week with raves from people with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity. One is the Healthmate air filter from Austen (at right), and the other an all metal utility heater fan from Honeywell. The person chirping about the heater said she had to run it for a few hours out in the garage first before it was safe, but once that was accomplished, she loves it! As with any product, remember that what works for one canary might not work for another, so be cautious whenever trying new consumer goods.

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Tags: Art, Chemicals, EPA, Food, Home, Pesticides, Products

2 Responses to “In the news: Chemical regulation, pesticide ingredients, and healthy art”

Susan E.

11. Oct, 2009

dear susie,
gotta disagree with the masses on this inku mckenzie “safe art.” I have been an artist for decades, and many, many artists have some degree of mcs or ei. Eva Hesse, probably the first artist to use latex in her art, used many other chemicals without any protection and died from cancer in her early 30s. People have long thought her cancers were a direct result of her mediums. with the mckenzie stuff I see only one sentence repeated over and over again on the internet. She may be finding materials less toxic to herself, but it looks more like she’s found materials less toxic to the planet (and sometimes these concerns are diametrically opposed.) China cut down their trees centuries ago and many provinces have relied on bamboo for everything, and now they’re trying to say it’s greener than our materials so they can sell it to us. It’s pure hype – - green movement commerce, which green movement prefer to call prosperity or wealth. What many people say are “safer” materials are often unexamined, unstudied, popular, faddish hypotheses. Recycled materials of any sort often have chemicals, and the exact contents are less known than when something comes from an original source, say a sawmill. It sounds like McKenzie has come up with a publicity tactic that is propelling her art to certain popularity heights, while thousands of other artists who aren’t so media savvy have been producing less and less toxic art for decades. Unfortunately gallery owners, art buyers and others – - including the artists themselves – - often fuse the “green movement” and the “mcs movement” precepts. Therefore I have recently seen galleries of latex paintings which I react to much more and worse than galleries of oil paintings. Someone informed me that latex was safer than oils. It’s certainly not the case if you’re allergic to latex! Oils by themselves are not so toxic, but it depends entirely what makes the pigment the color it is. Lead white and zinc white are possibly problems. Lead of course. But aquamarine or alizaron crimson might be fine. Oil is the base. Acrylic is a base. Latex is a base. But they all also have colors within them made from other chemicals like vegetable matter, minerals, elements, etc. I know that linseed oil and mineral spirits would affect me negatively right now, if I were to use them, but after it dries or cures, then an oil is fine. And a latex is not. Support your local artists. Go back to the periodic table of the elements and start to do your homework. Everything has chemical properties. Petroglyphs were/are pretty chemical free! There is lots and lots of art produced or being produced without hype that is fine for MCS people. If you like paintings, try to buy a few watercolors. A good water color is done on acid-free and lignin-free paper, and has been for decades, and if it’s not good paper it will warp terribly. Arches is a great brand of paper, but there are others. But be aware that art is in the eye of the beholder. Your grandmother’s quilt hung on the wall is wonderful, handmade art. A person does not need oil paint sofa paintings. Hang up a shovel and a rusty saw over the fireplace. Literally anything can be art. Please tell your readers not to over-react as if Inku art was the first “safe” art ever made, or the only “safe” art currently. We all have to think for ourselves, and not hop on too many bandwagons. Big money has taken over the green movement. Buyer beware. And support your living, real-in-the-flesh local artists. You can get to know them and talk about materials they and other artists use. Visit their studios. Take them to lunch.

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Susie Collins

11. Oct, 2009

Aloha Susan and welcome to The Canary Report! Thanks for all the good info on art products. You will find that over and over again on my blog I say that the current craze for “green” does not always translate into “safe for people.” Another of my mantras is that what is safe for one person with MCS, might not be safe for another, so always proceed with caution with any consumer goods.

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