A local artist has created an eco-art project in Tuvalu to highlight the threat rising sea levels caused by global warming pose to island nations and draw attention to the issue for an upcoming international summit on climate change.
Vincent Huang (黃瑞芳), who visited the South Pacific island nation in the middle of last month to create the installation artworks, said in a recent interview that his eco-art project has been warmly welcomed by the Tuvaluan government.
“They [the artworks] sent a message” of willingness to jointly launch other eco-art projects during a UN Climate Change Conference set to take place in Doha from Nov. 26 through Dec. 7, Huang said after meeting top Tuvaluan government officials.
Photo: CNA
During a four-day stay in Tuvalu that began on Sept. 17, Huang and his crew set up an installation art piece on a beach consisting of a fuel truck nozzle tied in a knot. The 4m by 2m artwork also featured an image of a polar bear relaxing in a hammock. It symbolizes the end of the world’s reliance on oil and a move back toward a life of simplicity, Huang said.
Another one of Huang’s installations, set up in the waters off the country’s coastline, featured images of polar bears squeezed into oil drums, a concept inspired by oil giant Royal Dutch Shell’s plan to drill for oil in the Arctic region.
Oil exploration causes environmental damage and continued global warming could put Tuvalu in an even more precarious situation as a result of rising sea levels, the 41-year-old artist said.
Photo: CNA
Tuvaluan Governor-General Sir Iakoba Taeia Italeli expressed his gratitude for Huang’s concern and his efforts to draw attention to the fact that Tuvalu would be one of the first victims of a rise in sea levels as a result of global warming.
“I think this kind of assistance is so important to us,” the governor-general said in a video in which he commented on Huang’s project.
Huang’s art project in Tuvalu coincided with a visit to the islands by the UK’s Prince William and his wife on Sept. 18 and Sept. 19, which the artist said would help garner more international media attention for his environmental message.
During another trip to Tuvalu in 2010, the artist waded out to a reef on the country’s main island where he erected a small sculpture of a desiccated mermaid made of dried coconut shells and pieces of palm trees.
The figure of the dried Little Mermaid represented the failure of the UN Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in late 2009, the artist said.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday said it had deployed patrol vessels to expel a China Coast Guard ship and a Chinese fishing boat near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. The China Coast Guard vessel was 28 nautical miles (52km) northeast of Pratas at 6:15am on Thursday, approaching the island’s restricted waters, which extend 24 nautical miles from its shoreline, the CGA’s Dongsha-Nansha Branch said in a statement. The Tainan, a 2,000-tonne cutter, was deployed by the CGA to shadow the Chinese ship, which left the area at 2:39pm on Friday, the statement said. At 6:31pm on Friday,
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, would pose a steep challenge to Taiwan’s ability to defend itself against a full-scale invasion, a defense expert said yesterday. Institute of National Defense and Security Research analyst Chieh Chung (揭仲) made the comment hours after the PLAN confirmed the carrier recently passed through the Taiwan Strait to conduct “scientific research tests and training missions” in the South China Sea. China has two carriers in operation — the Liaoning and the Shandong — with the Fujian undergoing sea trials. Although the PLAN needs time to train the Fujian’s air wing and
STRIKE: Some travel agencies in Taiwan said that they were aware of the situation in South Korea, and that group tours to the country were proceeding as planned A planned strike by airport personnel in South Korea has not affected group tours to the country from Taiwan, travel agencies said yesterday. They added that they were closely monitoring the situation. Personnel at 15 airports, including Seoul’s Incheon and Gimpo airports, are to go on strike. They announced at a news conference on Tuesday that the strike would begin on Friday next week and continue until the Mid-Autumn Festival next month. Some travel agencies in Taiwan, including Cola Tour, Lion Travel, SET Tour and ezTravel, said that they were aware of the situation in South Korea, and that group
Taiwanese celebrities Hank Chen (陳漢典) and Lulu Huang (黃路梓茵) announced yesterday that they are planning to marry. Huang announced and posted photos of their engagement to her social media pages yesterday morning, joking that the pair were not just doing marketing for a new show, but “really getting married.” “We’ve decided to spend all of our future happy and hilarious moments together,” she wrote. The announcement, which was later confirmed by the talent agency they share, appeared to come as a surprise even to those around them, with veteran TV host Jacky Wu (吳宗憲) saying he was “totally taken aback” by the news. Huang,
RSS