Sugaring Surface

In Sugaring Surface, I painted a sugar solution onto urban surfaces including building facades, paved ground, staircases, and crosswalks. Using brushes and clothes, I coated these spaces to form glossy, reflective layers that sharply contrasted with untreated areas. Over time, wind, rain, human movement, and insects gradually eroded the sugar. Its edges softened, merged with the surrounding surfaces, and eventually disappeared. Through this process, sugar operates as both material and narrative. Historically tied to colonial exploitation and industrial production, sugar is also a ubiquitous element of contemporary diets and a substance that dissolves and reenters ecological cycles. Its omnipresence and excess coexist with its vulnerability and impermanence. By painting sugar onto urban surfaces, the work frames the city as a site where material histories surface temporarily, only to be absorbed back into everyday life.