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Yesterday is so close, yet it is so dim and distant.
The evocative photographs of Macao taken by Ou Ping indeed stir old memories, and I can almost hear the whistle blowing to assemble PE class.
That was the season when flame trees bloomed. With their teachers at their head, 40 to 50 primary students walk like a line of ducklings to the former Workers’ Field in Praia Grande. They hurry along the cobbled streets along Calcàda de S. João and march on round the Escola Portuguesa de Macau, tiled in exquisite Portuguese ceramics. Students playfully run their fingers along the rough surfaces of the walls and wonder how they will spend the only precious outdoor lesson during the entire week – play football? Climb big trees? Or torment defenceless flying insects and ants......
Thinking back on my own childhood, Labour Football Field in the 60’s and 70’s seemed especially broad and spacious. Under the unremitting sun, I could detect the moisture of the thick, solid earth on which children chased each other with abandon. Boys ran back and forth passing their basketball, and lion dancers cavorted to the infectious beat of gongs and drums, admired and applauded.
On festival nights, the Labour Football Field took on another aspect – a phalanx of shining light bulbs made the area as bright as day. Inside and outside the main gate huge portraits were on display. Crowds streamed continuously into the city centre’s largest outdoor space as men and women, old and young, forgot their workday woes and enjoyed wonderful performances. Performers did their level best on the temporary stage and threw themselves into the unique roles provided by this unique era......
We should extend our sincere thanks to Mr Ou Ping, a sophisticated photographer engaged in journalism for over 40 years. He has used his acute artistic senses to record an impressive and distinctive Macao through the lens of his camera. Last year, Mr. Ou very generously presented his works to the Macao Museum of Art, so that all residents and visitors might retrace the memories of a bygone era in this small city.
These photographs summon memories of the past. On the occasion of National Day, temporary ceremonial arches would be erected in the middle of the square, rivalling each other for sheer beauty, and constituted a unique record of the ancient city. In a downtown street area, a bespectacled barber attends his customer, barely noticing that he has became the focus of a photographic assignment. Look at the Pontoon Nº1( in chinese known as “Long Life Bridge” )- we haven’t seen that for a long time, the water underneath twinkling in the light. What a tranquil and beautiful scene!
With the passage of time, the original harmony and simplicity of the coastal city has changed at an astonishing pace. Overnight, the Labour Football Field in Praia Grande - which has nurtured generations of teenagers - has been enclosed by walls and a pall of dust kicked up by clumsy, robotic machines. What a pity!
Yesterday has gone. Is the Labour Football Field the only loss in the headlong rush for change in the city? It’s difficult to imagine that a man-made volcano will soon rise up along the once-tranquil coastline – and while we feel uneasy, we are also grateful to the painters, photographers, poets and writers who have used their different skills to maintain every face, every tree, every story and every touching moment in witnesses to an unbending spirit and unity.
Fragments of Macao’s past reside in the people’s affection for this little place – fragments of our collective memory make us the community we are today.
Ung Vai Meng
Director of the Macao Museum of Art
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