For this project, we work as a pair. With our parents, we discussed our thoughts on the subject of environmental issues and what we care about. And after the discussion, we were going to make a mask for each other by using natural dyes and materials that we could find. For Yawen, she feels that with the city’s development, the percentage of the vegetation areas become harder to find. That affects the environmental points of view, for example, the “Heat Island Effect.” But also brings more anxiety to the city, which is already too intense.
For the mask created for Yawen, I used three layers of material to represent the idea of an invasion of the city to the natural environment. In the background of the mask, you will find purple that covers the foundation, which represents the sky. Because the light is refracted by the atmosphere, the clear sky is supposed to be blue. However, what comes with the development of the city is air pollution. Adding the color purple represents polluted air, which is the side effect caused by industrial behaviors.
At the mid-ground is a representation of vegetation that lives in gaps. I used matcha to dye the cloth green. At the left, where the green cloth got waived to gather, is the representation that the vegetations are all fighting for small areas to survive. The right side of the mask represents we are also codependent on the nature in the side of the city.
Join the foreground; there are bottles caps all around the surface, attached magnetically. The bottles caps are a representation of how men made things that overtake the space from nature.
