PHILIPPINES: Artist Aze Ong creates colourful pieces of art from crochet, a process usually associated with crafts

Record ID: 580519

  • Title: PHILIPPINES: Artist Aze Ong creates colourful pieces of art from crochet, a process usually associated with crafts
  • Date: 18th October 2011
  • Summary: MANILA, PHILIPPINES (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF ARTIST AZE ONG CROCHETING ORANGE AND YELLOW DISC-SHAPED CROCHET PIECE
  • Embargoed: 2nd November 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Philippines
  • Country: Philippines
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky
  • Reuters ID: LVA8YRZU1S9AVJ8XLUGRJ84VXHV0
  • Story Text: Filipino artist Aze Ong said she can crochet for hours on end.
    She started the meticulous hobby in school, and went on to make her own purses and accessories.
    Two decades later, the 34-year-old is now seeking to elevate the craft of crochet into a form of art.
    Ong's rainbow-coloured, whimsical crochet sculptures are featured in an art exhibit entitled Liwanag (Light), at Manila's Rizal Park.
    She said she started crocheting obsessively, and before she knew it, her wheel-like creations were stretching to 16-feet long and taking on three-dimensions.
    But Ong said she still has to deal with people's misconceptions about crochet.
    "There are times when I get discouraged, because some say 'oh, it's just crafts'. That stings a bit, because I don't do this as crafts. It's not mass production," Ong said.
    Her work includes crochet work in the form of leaves, wheels, a sunflower, a mushroom-shaped light installation, and a giant bag weighing 10 kg (22 lbs).
    She said she doesn't follow patterns or numbered guides. Instead she lets her mood and imagination dictate the forms.
    Ong said her creations are more like companions, outlets for emotional experiences.
    Circles or wheels are a recurring theme in her works, with her piece "Kaliwanagan" (Enlightenment), a mushroom-shaped lampshade, made with multi-coloured discs patched together.
    "When you experience something -- that's why these are circles -- because life's a cycle, right? Sometimes you're up, down, in the middle," Ong said.
    She said her artwork also draws inspiration from her experience living with a hill tribe in southern Philippines, where people had old cultural traditions and strong links to nature.
    The president of the Art Association of the Philippines, Fidel Sarmiento, said he immediately saw the artistic value in Ong's works.
    "Her works are not like the typical ones that you put in a frame, or you can reproduce. All her works are original. And her art is meaningful," Sarmiento said.
    She is proof, he added, that there is a budding artist in anyone with a passion for creating, no matter the medium.
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