How recipes knit our past with our present
October 14, 2023 2:20 AM Subscribe
Bev Moon | Fortune (a knitted yum cha for my mother’s 90th birthday), 2021-2022, Mixed media, on a table with central rotating Lazy Susan - interview with Moon, a second/third-generation Chinese New Zealander on art and craft, diaspora belonging and where family stories become national history.
What a great project, and the family pictures are so joyous too.
The whole interview is worth a read, but I particularly loved this bit, which sums up so much about the love and the guilt that are often inextricable in families:
I wasn't familiar with the history of poll tax Chinese in New Zealand, so here's a brief explanation for anyone else who might want some more context. A little different approach than the US's Chinese Exclusion Act and subsequent quotas.
posted by the primroses were over at 5:32 AM on October 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
The whole interview is worth a read, but I particularly loved this bit, which sums up so much about the love and the guilt that are often inextricable in families:
It’s only recently that I started making stuff to show people. My mother was a refugee and my dad worked two jobs day and night for years. They really wanted us all to be doctors and accountants and lawyers and art was just this frivolous thing. My dad slaved away for 32 years on this wet concrete floor in the fish and chip shop – my art probably wasn’t what he slaved away for. I used to always feel guilty about it. I think that’s why I picked up knitting, because it was useful and there was a reason to do it. And because knitting was something I learned early on from my mum. Knitting and cooking are two things that Mum and Grandma did. It made sense to put them together – it was just a way of expressing my story.I have been meaning to do a family holiday gift of getting a couple of recipes in my grandma's handwriting printed onto kitchen towels for my siblings and cousins. Maybe this will be the year to make it happen.
I wasn't familiar with the history of poll tax Chinese in New Zealand, so here's a brief explanation for anyone else who might want some more context. A little different approach than the US's Chinese Exclusion Act and subsequent quotas.
posted by the primroses were over at 5:32 AM on October 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
You can see more pictures of her work here.
posted by chrisulonic at 6:32 AM on October 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by chrisulonic at 6:32 AM on October 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
My god I love this. I love to knit and I love dim sum (what my family calls yum cha). The table with the food and steamer baskets reminds me of childhood Sundays with my extended Chinese family at the Pink Pearl in Vancouver. In this photo I *think* I even see a glimpse of my granny’s (and now my) favourite dish, wu gok.
Thank you for a lovely post with a lovely article! Such fab photos of her family.
Interesting and sad to see the various iterations of Chinese poll taxes and exclusion acts around the world. My country had both, though neither affected my family directly as they immigrated here a few decades later.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 6:20 PM on October 14, 2023
Thank you for a lovely post with a lovely article! Such fab photos of her family.
Interesting and sad to see the various iterations of Chinese poll taxes and exclusion acts around the world. My country had both, though neither affected my family directly as they immigrated here a few decades later.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 6:20 PM on October 14, 2023
This is beautiful - both the interview and the artwork. Thanks for sharing it.
posted by EvaDestruction at 8:56 AM on October 16, 2023
posted by EvaDestruction at 8:56 AM on October 16, 2023
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