TIDE TABLE
Water is an extremely precious element in the low-lying atolls, despite the fact that they are surrounded by water. Fresh water can only be collected through harvesting rain water from the roofs, as salt water from the ocean is of little use. While living in the Marshall Islands, I often find myself carefully delegate my water usage - for example, two 10-litre (2 gallon) buckets of water for a shower, two 2.5-litre (0.5 gallon) bowls of water for doing all the dishes, etc. On the other hand, I am surrounded by the oceanscape, synchronising my activities with the tide rising and falling, sunrise and sunset. Each glimpse of the ocean is the same landscape but a different variation.
Each mark is made by a small piece of translucent Japanese paper (about 3x4cm, 1.2x1.5in) touching less than a drop of diluted ink, allowing it to spread its own ways through the fibre, forming random stains. Within a large surface, thousands of these "pixels", resembling miniature landscapes, are layered and weaved with same size "pixels" of realistic photographs (see detail shot) from which the colour palette of each work is taken. These installations alter our default way of seeing landscapes, and the hierarchy of realism and abstraction.
Water is an extremely precious element in the low-lying atolls, despite the fact that they are surrounded by water. Fresh water can only be collected through harvesting rain water from the roofs, as salt water from the ocean is of little use. While living in the Marshall Islands, I often find myself carefully delegate my water usage - for example, two 10-litre (2 gallon) buckets of water for a shower, two 2.5-litre (0.5 gallon) bowls of water for doing all the dishes, etc. On the other hand, I am surrounded by the oceanscape, synchronising my activities with the tide rising and falling, sunrise and sunset. Each glimpse of the ocean is the same landscape but a different variation.
Each mark is made by a small piece of translucent Japanese paper (about 3x4cm, 1.2x1.5in) touching less than a drop of diluted ink, allowing it to spread its own ways through the fibre, forming random stains. Within a large surface, thousands of these "pixels", resembling miniature landscapes, are layered and weaved with same size "pixels" of realistic photographs (see detail shot) from which the colour palette of each work is taken. These installations alter our default way of seeing landscapes, and the hierarchy of realism and abstraction.
Title: Tide Tables / 6am
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Title: Tide Tables / 12pm
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Title: Tide Tables / 6pm
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Dimension: 192cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (76in W x 43in H x 1.5in D). Collapsable into 3 panels of 64cm W x 108cm H x 4cm D (25in W x 43in H x 1.5in D) each.
Materials: Mixed media (4000 pieces of Japanese paper, light-fast Indian ink, and transparent waterproof acrylic medium)
Title: Misfits, Offcuts, and Castaways No.3
Dimension: Variable
Material: Mixed media (moving images, 20,000 small pieces of Japanese paper, and light-fast Indian ink)
1 minutes 55 seconds
All camera work, image, and editing by Yi Dai
Dimension: Variable
Material: Mixed media (moving images, 20,000 small pieces of Japanese paper, and light-fast Indian ink)
1 minutes 55 seconds
All camera work, image, and editing by Yi Dai