Creative Macau presents the exhibition “Mountain Surrounded by Sea”, by Crystal Chan and Benjamin Hodges. In an invitation to contemplate the horizon, in times of confinement, the two artists explore the transformation of Macau over the years with an installation of sound and image, which evokes the conquest of land over the sea.
The conquest of the land over the sea and the memory of a city in constant transformation are the themes of the exhibition “Mountain Surrounded by Sea”, by Crystal Chan and Benjamin Hodges, at Creative Macau. Through a sound installation and the recreation of an apartment in the area of the new landfills, the artists use an artificial window to reflect on the reclaiming of land from the sea.
“The installation has two sections. One is the artificial recreation of an apartment, the interior of an apartment, as if it had been built on a movie set, with a huge image of a window, and, through that image of a window, we created the perspective of this land claim from the sea," explains Benjamin Hodges.
A native of Macau, Crystal Chan returned to the territory at the end of March, after a stay in New York, and had to complete the 14-day quarantine period at one of the designated hotels.
“From the window of my hotel, I saw a kind of mountain with a series of small islands, the result of land reclamation, and a whole scenario of construction and development. In Macau we are supposed to be surrounded by the sea and mountains, but more and more we have stopped seeing mountains, or they have become very difficult to see. My 14-day stay at that hotel had a kind of resonance in the work I was doing, namely in the editing of the sound. This quarantine experience gave me the possibility to have moments of contemplation, something I wanted to bring to this exhibition," says Crystal.
With a career in painting, the Macau artist is exploring sound installation for the first time.
“Through my sounds, I want people to reflect on our relationship with the space that surrounds us, with the land we stand on. And I leave it open to people to feel their relationship with Macau through sound,” explains the artist, also describing the type of spaces she chose for the installation. “I recorded the sounds of yum cha, in a dim sum restaurant, I recorded the sound of the coastal shore where people ride bicycles, the sounds of birds, and for the sound composition I added some music with instruments. It is a very long sound composition, of about two hours, so that people have the chance to stay longer and have a personal experience of contemplation, being at the discretion of each one to determine how long they intend to spend contemplating," she says.
To accompany Crystal Chan's sound installation, Benjamin Hodges built a replica of a Macau apartment with a false window and the projection of a sand mountain with sea around it.
“The animation is almost a ghostly presence, a mirage of fishermen at sea when we look at the horizon. A refraction of light on a distant horizon. As in any interior space, we play with this idea of a distant vision that is both the future and the past, from which we have not been able to dissociate and that, for this reason, becomes a kind of mirage," says the American artist, explaining that he used a traditional diorama for the projection of images that invokes a translucent past in a changing present.
In order to evoke the ancient fishermen of Macau, Benjamin placed styrofoam containers filled with water and a projection on the ceiling with the surface of the water and marine elements on the other side of the room. According to the artist, the intention is to create a ripple effect, to “represent the disturbance of the environment” caused by the action of man, together with the disappearance of traditional professions, caused by the development of the tourism and gaming industry.
“We have to point out the real risk of the impact of these changes on the environment, but also of the impact it has had on people's lives. Nowadays, Macau people find work in casinos and the traditional fishing profession is being lost. The idea is to invite people to contemplate this new physical space and to reflect on how nature has had to adapt," says Benjamin.
The exhibition “Mountain Surrounded by Sea” will be at Creative Macau until the 6th of June.