Square feet of empty toothpaste tubes and bottles of cleaning solution, pencils, balls of wool or shoes—these objects, arranged in neat rows, could be seen at Waste Not, a spectacular installation by Song Dong (born 1966) comprising more than 10,000 individual items, which traveled around the world, inspiring countless exhibition visitors. During the Cultural Revolution, the artist’s mother fell into poverty and compulsively collected everyday objects. The installation arranges everything she accumulated, cataloguing and documenting her life. Song Dong has also arranged old doors and windows from demolished buildings to create new living spaces, and in Doing Nothing Garden at Documenta 12, he transformed a mountain of garbage into an attractive recreation area, while in Eating the City he created modern cityscapes out of candy. This is the first volume to survey all of the projects by the Chinese conceptual artist, in which he deals with issues such as consumption, sustainability, memory and spirituality.
