Ming pottery shards turned into to art

Artist Alice Chang's mosaic-covered sculptures have become a magnet for tourists and locals alike in Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown. She collected centuries-old Ming Dynasty shards of pottery and transformed them into intricate sculptures, aiming to link these modern-day artworks to the ancient Silk Road and highlight Malaysia's historic role as a crossroads of global trade during the Ming Dynasty. The fragments of Chinese pottery that Alice Chang uses to craft her exhibition pieces were recovered from the Wanli shipwreck off the coast of Malaysia, and date back to the late 16th and early 17th centuries. UNESCO has recognized the wreck as a World Underwater Heritage Site as part of its Silk Roads Programme. Some 9,000 shards of pottery have been recovered from the wreck, which is believed to have been sunk during an explosion in a battle between Portuguese and Dutch ships. And now they are receiving a modern twist through the sculptor's work.