Wu Jin Qi Yong (Waste Not)

From the Waste Not exhibition by Song Dong in the Curve Gallery in the Barbican.
The whole space is filled with objects collected by the artist's mother, Zhao Xiangyuan, over 50 years.
From the Cultural Revoulution, when you had to be frugal to survive, to a becoming a method for coping after her husband's death, she seemed to throw nothing away. Song Dong helped her to sort through the collection to put on show as a way to help her let go of it.
It's an amazing sight, the way even humble things like empty plastic bottles and pieces of material can have a beauty when collected together. And very poignant as a reflexion of the hardship Zhao Xiangyuan lived through.