Anwen Leung’s artwork: The Bittermelon Understands

This artwork is inspired by Leung Ping Kwan’s poems ‘Bittermelon’ and ‘Travelling With a Bitter Melon’.

Date	2013
Colour	Colour
Format	Interactive installation, acrylic glass, polystyrene plastic, pinewood, plywood, aluminum
Author's Note	Inspired by Leung Ping Kwan’s poems ‘Bittermelon’ and ‘Travelling With a Bitter Melon’, The Bittermelon Understands is an interactive installation that is meant to serve a therapeutic purpose by allowing the public to unload their troubles on paper and contribute to the piece. In our lives, we experience many difficult moments. When that occurs, we often look to others for help. But we may not want to risk burdening others, or appear vulnerable. It becomes even harder to bear if our cries are met with indifference. Yet we cannot keep all our sadness inside, and risk destroying ourselves from within. So what do we do when we go through trauma? Maybe we tell our troubles to the Bittermelon. The bittermelon has been lovingly nicknamed “the gentleman’s vegetable” because when cooked, it keeps its bitterness to itself without affecting the foods cooked alongside it. By writing to the bittermelon your frustrations, your secret sorrow, your unspeakable agony, you unburden yourself without harming anyone. Its silent stillness comprehends and accepts you and all your hardships, without judgement, without mockery. Even when it doesn’t console you with a warm embrace or a visit to your home, we would find peace in knowing that “The bittermelon understands.” You’d like to heal this bad fever of a world. … In these shaken times, who more than you holds in the wind… ‘Ode to Bittermelon’, 1988-89
Material Type	Image
Collection	Journeys of Leung Ping Kwan
Source	Anwen Leung
Note to Copyright	Permission for use in Hong Kong Memory is given by Anwen Leung
Accession No.	lcs-yasi-0083

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