Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5)

Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5) (2025) was jointly commissioned by MAC yapang and Bankstown Arts Centre for the group exhibition “Bamboo Entwine as they Grow”, with artists Cindy Yuen Zhe Chen and Sarah Ong.

In pre-colonial Indonesia and Malaysia, young people would write love sonnets on bamboo as a kind of courting ritual. In Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5) Baker attempts to revive the practice of writing love letters on bamboo, as well as the deep oral poetry practice in her mother’s culture, known as Bidayǔh culture, that has now disappeared.

Baker has carefully composed these poems by combining ancient records of Bidayǔh poetry, translated by poet Carol Rubenstein in 1973, with writing collected from her own mother. Written as though addressing a familial elder, these poems reflect on the yearning for family, ancestors and land that drives much of Baker’s art practice. As the green bamboo ages and dries in the gallery space, the poems slowly fade, reflecting the erosion of Bidayǔh language and culture.


Artwork details:
bamboo, wood, paint

dimensions variable




Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5), 2025, installation view, Bankstown Arts Centre, NSW. Documentation by Dean Qiulin Li .



Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5), 2025, installation view, Bankstown Arts Centre, NSW. Documentation by Dean Qiulin Li.



Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5), 2025, installation detail, Bankstown Arts Centre, NSW. Documentation by Dean Qiulin Li.


Untitled (bamboo love poems 1-5), 2025, installation detail, Bankstown Arts Centre, NSW. Documentation by Dean Qiulin Li.