Correspondent photo / John Patrick Gatta “Just Like Home,” an installation by Rachel Hatthorn of Warren is displayed at the “Rubbish On Park” exhibit at Art On Park in Courthouse Square in Warren. Along with a photo and a collage, she had three pieces in Friday’s show.

WARREN — The three key environmental strategies aimed at minimizing waste — reduce, reuse and recycle — feature in downtown Warren’s Art on Park’s latest exhibit, “Rubbish on Park.”

The pieces incorporate items usually trashed or collected to be turned into new products. Curator Ashley Kellar explained the idea behind the show.

“This one’s, basically, stuff made out of things that you wouldn’t typically see in artworks. Don’t paint unless it’s on something weird; no paint on a canvas. A lot of the pieces are made out of trash, which is really cool.”

Kellar said the inspiration to curate “Rubbish on Park” resulted from her interactions with the kids art club she directs every other Sunday at Art on Park.

“We do trash builds a lot with the kids because it’s really fun to work with them and see what they can think up from stuff we usually throw away. It’s something that’s real inventive for them because they get to use their brains with it, too, but also create,” Kellar said.

Referring to Aimee Mallory’s piece “Litter City,” she said, “It’s made completely of trash that she found walking.”

Besides objects discovered on the ground, artists collected items from Clover Recycling in Warren and their homes. Exhibited at Art on Park’s previous show, “Collab on Park,” the piece “Warren Blooms” also fits with the current display. Created by the Crafty Clovers group, it features plastic bottle caps, plastic bags and a Styrofoam egg carton to produce the city’s name with “flowers” surrounding it.

Also incorporated into the artworks were plastic jar caps, Easter eggs and straws as well as branches, newspapers, a shower head, beer bottle caps and bubble wrap.

Victoria Brayer recreated Vincent Van Gogh’s famous painting, “The Starry Night,” while Marley Matters made “VHS 1” by reusing videotape to construct “dresses” on mannequins.

Rachel Hatthorn of Warren has three pieces in the exhibit, including a photo and collage. Her installation, “Just Like Home,” brings together items from her home, her mother’s home, those found at Art on Park and Clover Recycling as well as discarded garbage not properly disposed.

Discussing the display, she said, “I’m usually a photographer but I’ve started to spread out and push the envelope a little with other items like collage. This is probably the biggest thing I’ve done so far.

“I live in the older part of the city, central part of the city, and in early spring, when the snow melts, you see all the trash lining the street. So, I pick it up once in a while when I walk my dog.”

Hathhorn added, “The biggest inspiration was my cousin who ran the lawnmower off of my old patio mat and one thing led to the next.”

Keeping with environmental intentions, she said, “When I do pick it up, everything will get donated back to Clover Recycling so it’s not in a landfill.”

Asked what she hopes visitors get from the exhibit, Kellar said, “I hope they would look at things that aren’t considered art normally and see that it also is art. It doesn’t have to be a quote unquote fine arts piece, a landscape or a still life.”

“There’s all kinds of different forms of art. Some of it’s really grungy and gross and ugly, but it’s cool because it’s something that someone created and that could have been therapy for them.”