Local artist Mel Cheong Hoi I is showcasing her prints and art installations in an exhibition titled “Reality and Fantasy” at the UNESCO Centre of Macao in Nape.
Cheong told The Macau Post Daily during the exhibition’s opening ceremony last week that she designed the exhibits from 2019 to 2020, with the exhibition being about the “progress of making woodblock*”.
Cheong said that making a print requires wood to be carved, with its outcome or “reality” only to be seen at the “last minute” when the print is made. “In between, it’s all about imagination”.
The same can be said for the exhibition’s installations, with Cheong noting that until seeing the venue and setting it up, imagination is what she relied on at home when envisioning how the installations would look and preparing the materials to make them. “That’s why I have ‘Reality and Fantasy’ as my theme”, Cheong underlined.
Moreover, according to a statement provided at the opening ceremony, circles, a symbol often appearing in Cheong’s works, are also used in the exhibition, noting that each “represents a soul”.
The statement noted that the art material used in the exhibition is a “by-product” that Cheong used to replace baking paper to print her previous works, adding that the exhibits use projector films that she had reused many times before in previous works, taking on the colours, graphics and patterns from her previous creations.
The films were then cut into round shapes and sewn onto Washi, which is the Japanese word for traditional paper created from long inner fibres of three plants, according to the Washi Arts website. The statement said that this reflects a new stage of Cheong’s life as a mother.
Meanwhile, in her art installations, each circular lantern “symbolically carries a soul”, the statement said, adding that the lanterns are brought together to achieve different results through different arrangements.
Cheong is the advisor of the International Mokuhanga Association (Asia Region), president of the Macao Woodblock Print Association and the founding member of the Printmaking Research Centre of Macao. Her works have been exhibited in places such as France, Japan, Portugal, the US, and the mainland.
The exhibition runs until next Monday and is open daily from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. For enquiries, call 2872 5188 or email da_info@fm.org.mo.
*According to Wikipedia, woodblock printing or block printing is a technique for printing text, images or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later also on paper.
Photos taken last week by Rui Pastorin
Local artist Mel Cheong Hoi I describes her work to visitors during last week’s opening ceremony.
