[current affairs ~ affairs of currents] with TREES

2019

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CURRENTS 2019 Phnom Penh Art & Urban Festival

Private Wooden House, #8B, Street 308 (near Bassac Lane), Phnom Penh, Cambodia

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[current affairs ~ affairs of currents] by TAN Vatey is questioning rich economies ~ poor ecologies, in search of a we-we situation!

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Opening on 27 March 2019 in the frame of New Fields, a group exhibition with Daneth Eng, Nipan Oranniwesna & Vatey Tan, part of CURRENTS 2019. Thank you for your energy and care, Lyno Vuth, Pen Sereypagna, Chanveasna Chum & co! During the opening of the exhibition,  people could register for 🌱ADOPTING A BABY PLANT 🌱 !!

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Here some fragments of the conversation Sinta had with Vatey about [current affairs ~ affairs of currents] 💫:

Vatey: 🌳Trees are my friends, we grew up together, my swing was there, shadow for naps, sharing its fruits 🍊🍌🥥, sometimes also my toilet 🍄, hahaha… now many trees are dying with the current 🏙 urban development projects 🏗. For this art work, I took their cut and dead bodies ⚰ and made an installation to 🙇‍♀️ honor them 🎋. I didn’t want to use sharp tools ⚒ to carve or remodel them 🎨 and found ways to make wood speak to cement without forcing them to stay together. 🏗 Cement is a material of modernity, it’s also causing for our mountains ⛰ to disappear. When installing, some neighborhood 👧🧒 kids came in as they were curious about the cement on the tree trunks that looked like slimes. 🤹‍♀️🤸‍♂️ We played a game ✌👊🤚and the one who loses can paint the cement with colors… everyone wanted to lose 🏃‍♀️🏃‍♂️, hahaha! While we were working together, I told them my story about 🌳trees being my friends. They understood and realized there were not that many trees 🌳 around in Phnom Penh 🏟🏢🏭⛟🛵🚦🚧🚚🚛.

Sinta: The exhibition is only on for a short period, isn’t that shocking ⚡ for the baby plants 🌱?

Vatey: Yes, I also had that concern, so I left the 🌱 baby plants in their pot, not to shock them too much. We are also making a foster care plan 👨‍👧👩‍👦where visitors can register for adopting a 🌱 baby plant during the opening of the exhibition on 27 March. The kids will pick 10 names from the lucky draw and these people can ✒ sign an agreement 📃 where The Artist, The Curator, The Caretaker & The Plant 🌱, we all promise to take care of each other. With these Caretakers, we set up a group where we can put photos of the plants' 🌱 new homes 🏡, exchange tips of how to care for each plant 🍀, etc. and form a growing community open for others 👨‍🌾👩‍🌾.

Sinta: Happy that you found a way to channel the sadness 😥 in a healing way 😌 through the art you make, activating people of all ages (the youngest is 👶 2 years old 💞) to make us all practice ways to apply care for (and not only care about) nature! This reminds me of my friend Hai-Chay who proposed to not put ourselves -humans- but our environement ♻️ in the centre of our attention and then everyone will be taken care of! Thank you all dearly for that care… so that are the current affairs and the affairs of currents 🏳️‍🌈 🌁 in the urbanizing, industrializing and modernizing environment of Phnom Penh and the rest of Cambodia 🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱 🐜🐝🐞🦗🕷🐛🦋🐌.

 

CURRENTS 2019

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