Overflow, Koh recycles bottles that are collected by binners, people who roam the streets and alleys of Vancouver, picking up recyclable material – be it bottles, cans, scrap metal, clothing – and then trading or selling the items to for-profit or non-profit agencies. Koh is working with United We Can, well known in Vancouver for itscommunity based recycling service. The bottles are used to make processual sculptures and installations that change over the course of the exhibition.
With this humble gesture, Germaine Koh brings together an unusual team of partners and at the same time exposes some of the defining forces in Vancouver’s economic and cultural development, including questions relating to ecology, health and housing.
The exhibition is accompanied by this catalogue with an essay by Clint Burnham. This booklet accompanies the solo exhibition Overflow by Germaine Koh, held at Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, January 13 – February 17, 2007. Produced in collaboration with United We Can, the exhibit was a process-based site-specific installation of recuperated glass bottle