NAVA ARTIST FILE: SAI-WAI FOO

SAI-WAI FOO: My name is Sai Wai Foo.
So, I basically have a craft-based practice
and I primarily work in paper.
So, I'm kind of fascinated with kind of,
how you translate something that's essentially
a 2D medium into a 3D medium.
So, I use mainly pleating and then
I mix that back with a whole lot of ephemera.
So, it's an outlet for my hoarding, really
(LAUGHS).

NAVA: How did you get started and maintain your practice?

SAI-WAI FOO: My training is actually, in fashion design.
So, I studied back in the 90s which was...
seems like a very long time ago.
And the reason I got into fashion was -
I mean, I still love the industry, I'm still active in the industry.
I suppose, coming from immigrant Chinese background from Malaysia.
Having to have a job at the end of it
was really important to my parents and I suppose,
important to me as well.
You know, be able to have, you know, a living or such.
So, yeah, I went into fashion, I ended up in commercial design.
And after a while in that industry in Australia,
I thought, ''I'm really not doing anything that creative anymore."
I've always drawn, I've always made things.
I've always been good with my hands, you know.
I've got what they describe as a high level of manual dexterity.
So, about maybe ten years ago,
I went back and studied just a visual arts course at RMIT.
So, it was just a diploma course
and that was just so I got back into making again.
And I really fell in love with, I suppose, print making,
in terms of it being very process-driven.
And also printmakers, I think they're used to working in a collaborative
or studio environment as well, so.
That really appealed to me coming from fashion background
Where I've always worked in a studio environment.
I sort of was just playing around with paper and, you know,
the very essence of what the practice is now.
Just playing around with that and going into art competitions
and just entering and just having a deadline to work towards.
So, you know, that was the way I sort of started.

NAVA: Why is art important?

SAI-WAI FOO: It's an overwhelming need to be able to make and to do.
It calms me, it...
Is purely an extension of myself, it keeps me sane,
It's just something that I have to do.
If I don't do it, I... it's not that I'm making art all the time,
but I go through making binges and things like that.
And it's really satisfying actually, creating something at the end.
You're taking a raw material and turning it into something.
So, yeah, for me, it's just an overwhelming urge to be able to do it.

NAVA: What are the main challenges you've experienced in your career?

SAI-WAI FOO: Coming from a fashion background where it's a pretty tough industry.
It has actually toughened me up in a way.
I'm kind of glad I segued into art this particular way
and through the ways I have.
Like I've had sort of meandering course through it, so.
Even with showing my art now it's -
I haven't had a direct path to sort of galleries or, you know,
showing in regular or, you know, traditional means initially.
And I come via the means of printmaking and also crafts, so,
which are both really supportive and open practices.
So, people who are used to sharing information
and working collaboratively.
So, I felt really supported, in terms of challenges probably,
just being motivated.
That's something that, you know, just.
You just have to sort of, keep yourself going.
I think it's just any sort of self-driven practice
that's incredibly challenging.
And I think the other things is dealing with any sort of rejection
as well, you know.
We'll get the reject the -
awful rejection letter and I have this ongoing joke
about how I'm just gonna collect them all
and then put them into some sort of like installation piece
of how nobody loves me.
But you know, just getting over those issues.
But you know, you just sort of, dust yourself off and go,
"Alright, you know, what can I learn from this?
Move on, let's you know, go on to the next project."
But yeah, otherwise now I think
I've actually, had it pretty good so far. (LAUGHS)