Israeli designer Erez Nevi Pana used five tons of salt from the Dead Sea to create his Crystalline collection, which showcases how the material can be used as building blocks.
The collection consists of four sculptural elements: a ladder, boulder, steps and a walkway, and is on view at the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) Triennial in Melbourne.
Nevi Pana, who describes the pieces as "small-scale architecture", said they represent a journey from water to land.
Top image: the installation at the NGV. Photo is by Tom Ross. Above: the Crystalline installation represents a journey from water to land. Photo is by Sean Fennessy
The designer aims to eventually use salt from the Dead Sea and other saltwater bodies as a sustainable construction material for buildings. All of the Crystalline designs are made from solid salt, apart from the ladder, which has an aluminium base.
Salt crystals were grown on aluminium and luffa to create a ladder
Nevi Pana used more than five tons of salt to create the pieces, which aim to draw attention to the amount of salt left over in evaporation ponds.
"It was essential to present a product that benefits from the use of a large quantity of salt; in order to direct the discussion to the enormous amount of salt, neglected each year in the evaporation ponds," he told Dezeen.
"With Crystalline, the goal is to create an element that looks stable and firm, yet poetic and expressive by using a mass of salt with a definite shape.&q...