I create my pieces from objects picked up at Hac-Sá beach such as plastic, pocket lighters, tree trunks, driftwood, bottles, shoes, beach toys abandoned by tourists and residents, lost objects, anything brought by the ripple or unearthed by the waves. Quite a few fishing buoys come ashore on typhoon days. These are buoys made from huge pieces of styrofoam wrapped in fishing nets. They serve to signal nets and traps. I also use these styrofoams and fishing nets in my own pieces.
I transform these materials into art objects to represent the goal of encouraging the “Reuse, Recycle, and Reduce” – three actions that are still a very obscure subject in Macao.
During the current 2022-23 school year, the Steam Integration Coordinator Sarah Fenwick-Ross of the Macau International School used my pieces to organize a mini exhibition entitled “YOUR WASTE MY INSPIRATION”. One of the works in the exhibition had no title. It was an installation made with toys that I picked up almost every day at Hac-Sá beach. To give the work a title, a contest was organized in which students could participate. Each student had the possibility to give a name to the piece. More than 200 students signed up with great joy, very happy to have the pleasure of being able to name a piece of art. There was no shortage of very funny names, some very similar. The important thing was to make the students stop for a while and let them know what was really in front of them – some another 100 brand new, abandoned plastic toys at Hac-Sá beach. At the end of the contest the piece was given the name chosen by a 6th grader student named KUAI SANG. Thank you Kuai Sang for the beautiful name that I now call my exhibition “RAINBOW IN DISGUISE”.
