Sai-Wai Foo is a Melbourne based visual artist who began developing her practice in 2012. Her craft based practice is informed by her fashion design background and is primarily focused on the reworking of objects that are discarded and redundant; vintage books, manuscripts, silverware and objects that show the marks of a former existence, items that were have out-lived their owners or usefulness in a digital age.

In a contemporary world of mass-production the reworking yellowing pages into sculptural forms is foil to mechanical processes. The fragility of brittle aging paper gleaned from discarded books, manuscripts that bear marks of previous lives. The act of cutting, folding and manipulating paper beyond the flat plane, is implicit in its human connection and continues this discussion, pushing the work into the three-dimensional realm.

This narrative weaves through these elements, honouring the discarded, objects rich with the patina of age, once treasured but now castoff. In turn questioning how items are used and re-used. How the unwanted can be turned it into an object that will be again treasured, seeking to re-appropriate the rejected and imbue it with a new value, once again precious and prized.