artworks
Bath ducks no longer float in bathtubs or harbors...
In /M’s relief works, bath ducks rise from water, hanging mid-air against corporate logos, flags, and ubiquitous stock photos. Unlike regular palm-sized rubber ducks, these yellow ducks are produced through 3D printing, a process that makes miniature crafting and mass production easy. However, easy does not necessarily imply efficiency in this case. While mass production usually indicates division of labor and streamlined work, /M’s domestic version of 3D printing involves only one-man effort without any workshop or apprentice. Through designing, sourcing images, printing and attaching, the self becomes a factory. The result is the collective effort of human and machine. Although manual work is assisted with computers and printers, the non-handcrafted process is still extremely time-consuming. It can take hours to print a single coin-sized duck, so in works that include more than 200 ducks, just the printing process alone can take weeks to finish, let alone the time for securing each duck on the canvas.
In Hong Kong where people consider efficiency as priority, /M rejects speed with his slow motion mass manufacturing, slowly breaking away from the hustle culture in cities.
Behind each duck is a logo or symbol that is not foreign to any city-dwellers. Just like Andy Warhol’s Campbell Soups and Marilyn Monroes, these thumbnail icons speak to capitalism and consumerism. In this globalized era, corporate franchises and chains are no longer familiar to people of a certain country, but are recognized worldwide. Scaling down these logos does not make them illegible at all, especially modern-day logos are often minimal that makes recognition instant. But the interference of 3D-printed ducks prompts viewers to take a second look at these symbols and reconsiders the meaning behind them. Recalling childhood memories, bath ducks accompany us during times of relaxation and innocence. While the world was overwhelmed by consumer products and popular culture in Warhol’s postwar era, we are constantly overstimulated by information, knowledge, and decision-making in today’s world. As we reach adulthood along with the development of the internet, these bath ducks remind us to take a break from time to time while we get information and opinion overload.
