Megapolitan yet Traditional

All of the artists’ work references contemporary urban life that – especially in densely populated, highly efficiently organized megapolises like Hong Kong – seems to be caught between high tech and organic life, technology and nature.

At the same time, the objects continue the tradition of the East Asian art of miniature tree cultivation and plant arrangement that in the West is widely known under the Japanese term bonsai. In Chinese, artfully cultivated miniature landscape arrangements are known as potted landscapes, penjing. Unlike the tray sceneries of previous times, Lam’s miniature landscapes are not literally “potted” but instead transfer the idea of curated nature to the twenty-first century by making artificial nature grow from waste materials, creating a strange kind of beauty that at the same time evokes visions of nature and a technoid dystopia.

Feel free to explore another artwork in this digital UpCycling Hong Kong exhibition. But if you want to know more about e-waste and art, then please click below.