Portland Tropical Gardens
Portland Tropical Gardens is an artist-run space that envisions Portland’s first public indoor tropical garden. At PTG, you will find different types of plants that thrive in the dynamic and vast region of the tropics. PTG serves as a hub to educate the pubic about tropical plant-life and also hosts regular programming related to tropical culture and life. PTG is also host to the Center for Art & Public Wellness (CAPW), centered on the intersection between creative expression and holistic well-being.
PTG's founding members were Ralph Pugay, Shawn Creeden, Erika Dedini, Artist Michael Bernard Stevenson Jr. and myself, members of the Portland State University School of Art + Design community. This project is made possible thanks to the support of the PSU School of Art + Design and Portland Parks & Recreation. Rachel Hines was part of PTG's Center for Art & Public Wellness.
I was back home in the tropics during the first half of PTG's operations and my role was the tropical correspondent. Shawn and Michael made an organic matter plant care module (PCM) for the space, where people could see a picture of me and write me letters.
Here's what PTG looked like at a Saturday morning drawing class. The plants were lovingly tended to by Lead Horticultist Shawn Creeden.
PTG's founding members were Ralph Pugay, Shawn Creeden, Erika Dedini, Artist Michael Bernard Stevenson Jr. and myself, members of the Portland State University School of Art + Design community. This project is made possible thanks to the support of the PSU School of Art + Design and Portland Parks & Recreation. Rachel Hines was part of PTG's Center for Art & Public Wellness.
I was back home in the tropics during the first half of PTG's operations and my role was the tropical correspondent. Shawn and Michael made an organic matter plant care module (PCM) for the space, where people could see a picture of me and write me letters.
Here's what PTG looked like at a Saturday morning drawing class. The plants were lovingly tended to by Lead Horticultist Shawn Creeden.
As the tropical correspondent, I collected images such as this in urban Singapore. A community garden under a public housing block of flats.
I also made Tropical Correspondent episodes from the delightfully warm tropics (ha ha!) that were screened at PTG's various events starting in late winter. The first episode featured my friend, gardener and forager Esmonde Luo who took us on a tour of the jungle next to my house.
In the second episode, I reported from Sibu Island in Malaysia. At the end of the episode I recite a Tropical Manifesto. To read it scroll to the bottom of the page.
In the third episode, my grandmother Teo Siew Lan in Singapore teaches artist and educator Michelle Illuminato in Portland how to make cheng tng, a cooling Singaporean dessert.
Spoiler Room is an artist run audiovisual media collective from Portland, Oregon that organizes free social “episodes” and dance parties. As Tropical Correspondent, I was guest DJ for the Spoiler Room Singapore-themed PTG party. I DJ-ed for the first time and curated a selection of songs in various languages, that were mostly nationalistic, romantic or both - songs that were very strange to play in downtown Portland. I recited facts and quotes about Singapore. Footage of Singapore that I had recorded recently were mixed into the party's episode. Attendees were encouraged to dress in red and white, Singapore's colours. Watch the episode here.
I organised Thinking About Home, a series of events. Kayla Wiley, a Filipino American artist who grew up in Honolulu, HI, was the gurest artist.
Panel discussion- Tropical As Place & Home, with Hunter Shobe and Kayla Wiley
Hunter is a geography professor at Portland State University specialising in human geography. Drawing on theories of space & place, we discussed the tropical as idealized place, how home is created & what it means to be making work with tropical as homeland.
Tropical food circle
I made cheng tng, the dessert my grandma taught Michelle to make in Tropical Correspondent Episode 3. It looked magical but tasted rather artificial owing to the quality of ingredients available here.
One of the most amazing things I taught myself was chopping durian. I found the notorious fruit in FuBonn, Oregon's largest Asian mall. All the way from Thailand, it was frozen - unthinkable to someone from the tropics. My first chop was a very messy experience with weak, badly aimed cuts.

The Power of Rice
Installation and performance by Kayla Wiley
Wiley re-examines her relationship to the plant that her family uses to sustain their livelihood in the Philippines. She loves rice & blames it for her weight - the stem of her self-loathing. The lack of self control that surrounds eating is central to who she is. She will kneel on a pile of uncooked rice grains while consuming cooked rice for twenty minutes. Wiley also presents a rice sculpture formed with words that her Filipino family used to answer her question: "What does rice mean to you?"
Longing for Tropical Homeland
Performance by Salty Xi Jie Ng
Xi Jie meditates on what it means to be from & homesick for the tropical metropolis of Singapore. What is a mother tongue & what are the properties of fragrant pandan & pungent durian? Xi Jie will also answer letters addressed to the Tropical Correspondent, sent from the Plant Self Care Module in PTG made by Shawn Creeden & Michael Stevenson Jr.
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Tropical Island Manifesto
Some declarations:
I declare my self-awareness as an urban creature coming to a tropical island to get away from it all
I declare that the song Kokomo was in my head as I prepared for the trip
I declare that it’s nice to have a bad phone network connection on a tropical island
Some principles:
One could live in a hut by the sea and shower with water tapped from the well
One could attempt, as much as possible, to get used to mosquito bites until one is immune
One could worship the coconut trees, that are the very image of a tropical island, that provide shade and life-sustaining food
One could, if possible, lie in the sea and look at the sky for hours
One could breathe in lungfuls of sea air, get stung in the eye by some salt water, get thrashed by the waves some
One could breathe in lungfuls of jungle air, walk to the music of the waving trees, be careful not to destroy spider webs
One could pick up litter from the beach that island resorts don’t pick up
Some questions:
Why are we enchanted by tropical islands?
Why do tropical islands make us feel like relaxing?
Why are there no monkeys on this island?
What do the locals think of the resorts?
What does the sea think of all the humans?
What are tropical islands telling us about how to live?
Some confessions:
I admit that I slept extremely well because the sounds of sea and wind put me to bed
I admit that I woke up at 630am every morning
I admit that when I am in the sea I feel like a mermaid and it explained why The Little Mermaid was my favourite Disney Princess movie
I admit that I am not able to climb a coconut tree
I admit that when I left I felt stronger than before
Tropical Island Manifesto
Some declarations:
I declare my self-awareness as an urban creature coming to a tropical island to get away from it all
I declare that the song Kokomo was in my head as I prepared for the trip
I declare that it’s nice to have a bad phone network connection on a tropical island
Some principles:
One could live in a hut by the sea and shower with water tapped from the well
One could attempt, as much as possible, to get used to mosquito bites until one is immune
One could worship the coconut trees, that are the very image of a tropical island, that provide shade and life-sustaining food
One could, if possible, lie in the sea and look at the sky for hours
One could breathe in lungfuls of sea air, get stung in the eye by some salt water, get thrashed by the waves some
One could breathe in lungfuls of jungle air, walk to the music of the waving trees, be careful not to destroy spider webs
One could pick up litter from the beach that island resorts don’t pick up
Some questions:
Why are we enchanted by tropical islands?
Why do tropical islands make us feel like relaxing?
Why are there no monkeys on this island?
What do the locals think of the resorts?
What does the sea think of all the humans?
What are tropical islands telling us about how to live?
Some confessions:
I admit that I slept extremely well because the sounds of sea and wind put me to bed
I admit that I woke up at 630am every morning
I admit that when I am in the sea I feel like a mermaid and it explained why The Little Mermaid was my favourite Disney Princess movie
I admit that I am not able to climb a coconut tree
I admit that when I left I felt stronger than before