In his latest endeavor to help Tuvalu’s fight against climate change, Taiwanese artist Vincent J.F. Huang (黃瑞芳) has launched a crowdfunding project to fund the planting of mangrove trees to protect the coastline of the Pacific island nation.
Under the project that commenced last week, Huang said he hopes to plant about 7,000 trees on Tuvalu’s coastline in the form of a giant QR code.
People who scan the QR code would be connected to information about global climate change and rising sea levels that are threatening Tuvalu’s very existence, he said.
“By planting mangroves, we aim to slow down coastal erosion amid the threat of rising sea levels,” Huang said.
The idea came from German artist Joseph Beuys’ project in 1982 aimed at planting 7,000 oak trees in the German city of Kassel to promote green urban renewal, he said.
The crowdfunding campaign, in which Huang is soliciting donations of US$10, is to last until early next month, and Huang is scheduled to depart for Tuvalu on Aug. 21 with his team to plant mangroves on the coast of Funafala, one of Tuvalu’s nine islets.
He plans to use 7,000 mangrove trees to form the QR code shape over an area of 900m2 on the islet, which is inhabited by only five families, Huang said.
He said he also hopes to use the project to draw more attention to Tuvalu, which is one of Taiwan’s 22 diplomatic allies around the world, but is still unfamiliar to many Taiwanese.
Low-lying Tuvalu is projected to be one of the first countries in the world that will be submerged by the rising sea level.
“Once Tuvalu is submerged, many of the islands around the world will soon face the same crisis,” he said.
His project is being supported by Taipei 101 management and National Taiwan Normal University’s Graduate Institute of Environmental Education, as well as the Tuvaluan government.
Tuvaluan Ambassador to Taiwan Minute Taupo said he would help extend the project to other Pacific island countries facing the same crisis as Tuvalu, including Kiribati, Nauru, the Solomon Islands and the Marshall Islands, according to Huang.
Concerned about the peril of rising sea levels faced by Tuvalu, Huang visited the country in 2010 and 2012, setting up art installations to draw attention to the crisis.
He has since cooperated with Tuvalu on many projects in a continuous effort to call attention to the looming crisis.
In 2013, Huang was commissioned to organize the Tuvaluan pavilion at the Venice Biennale, as the country prepared to participate in the major international art exhibition for the first time.
Prior to that, Huang worked closely with Tuvalu during its participation in an exhibition that was held in conjunction with the UN Climate Change Conference in Qatar in late 2012.
His Animal Delegates, depicting creatures such as penguins and turtles that are likely to be the first victims of global warming, highlighted the environmental crisis in Tuvalu.
People who hope to make a donation to support the project can visit the site www.indiegogo.com/projects/art-mangroves-project-in-tuvalu#/.
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