Jacky Cheng’s paper art bridges the gap between ancient practices and modern art. Born in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and based in Australia, her work is highly influenced by Chinese religious practices: “I’m afraid that I will disconnect with my culture one day, and I don’t want to,” Cheng admitted once in an interview with Arctic Paper. “One of the aspects to preventing that is to keep making the artwork that I do.”
According to Cheng, her methods rely on her elders’ cultural practices and duties, performed during Chinese rituals. In particular, she recalls a practice performed by her grandmother, where she would stack and fold paper made of bamboo, and then burn it as a sacrifice to ancestors and gods.
“My grandmother would fold and fold, and then she would cut it and a little Chinese character appeared,” she explained in the interview. “It’s a lost art, since no one figured out how she did it. I do regret that I don’t know how to create them, but I’m very glad that I got that experience from my grandmother.”
Though Cheng moved to Australia in 2006, her art has preserved not only her culture and heritage but the very fabric of her memories. Weaving narratives from her native experiences, her art maps the social relationships between her origins and her newfound home.
The process itself involves a lot of cutting and folding. After gathering tiny pieces of paper, she glues the bottom, sticks them onto each other, and then proceeds to cut around them, eventually carving out a 3D model made entirely of paper. The end result, like the process itself, has many layers to it. Doesn’t its beauty speak for itself?
