PREFACE

Withstanding the tests of time is the silvery surface of the Nam Wan Lakes but the scenery along the waterfront has not. Erected from the reclaimed land where fishing boats once were jammed together and fishermen sun-dried their fishing nets, is the magnificent Macau Tower dwarfing everything around it including the century old banyan trees dotted along the opposite shore. The sharp contrast between the old and the new overwhelms people with the passing of time and changes of life.

Four hundred years is just a short episode in the long river of history of man but for the small city of Macau, lying at the estuary of the Pearl River, there have been numerous rises and falls. It has embraced challenges and overcome hardship as time has gone by. In the twentieth century, dramatic changes have happened to the development of the city and its social environment in particular the second and third decades which were a historic turning point for Macau when it metamorphosed from a small town into a modern city.

In the early 1920's, Macau had a population of about eighty thousand. Statistics reveal that in 1921 Macau had around sixty thousand fisherman, equivalent to 70% of the total population of Macau. The fishing industry had thus become the major formal economic pillar of Macau aside from the consumption activities of gambling, opium taking and prostitution. Auxiliary fishing industries such as the fish market, the making of fishing nets, cables and oars, fish salting, the processing of canned foods, shark fin and seasoning sauce, emerged and started to develop. A big dredging project in the Inner Harbour in 1923 and the reclamation project of the Outer Harbour in 1925 tremendously increased the size of Macau at its northern and south- western parts.

1924 was a special year for Macau when a rebellion broke out in Guangzhou causing an influx of refugees into the city. Eventually, Macau recorded a sudden increase in its population to a historic figure of about 200,000 (exactly 193,175) and a change in its structure. After the suppression of the rebellion, although the majority of the refugees returned to China, Macau still maintained an increased population of about 120,000. At that time, the handicraft industries of Macau recorded remarkable development. A grand and significant industrial exhibition, the "Macau Industrial Exhibition", was held in the Mong Ha area, in the vicinity of Avenida Horta e Costa and the Temple of Kun Iam, from 7 November to 12 December 1926, and a total visitor figure of 289,537 was recorded. The exhibition displayed the results of industrial development in Macau at full scale and the participating industries included fishing, canned food processing, shoe making, matches, fireworks, paper making, cigarette making and textile production. On 8th December of the same year,

Artur Tamagnini Sousa Barbosa was sworn in for his second term as the Governor of Macau (8 December 1926 - 2 January 1931). His first term of assignment (12 October 1918 - 17 July 1919) had given him a basic understanding of the situation of Macau. Thus, in his second term, he encouraged local Chinese merchants to invest and at the same time established and promoted harmonious relationships with the adjacent regions, in particular, to rectify the tense relationship with Guangdong. In March, 1928, the number of Mainland Chinese coming to Macau increased radically following the opening of the highway between Shiqi and Macau. At the same time, with the improvement of harbour conditions, water transportation in Macau developed at high speed especially that with Hong Kong. In addition, the manufacturing, tourist and property industries of Macau were also in full swing. By 1929, Macau had already established a number of factories including ten fireworks factories, ten cigarette making factories, twenty joss stick factories, three match factories, eight canned food processing factories, fifty four traditional Chinese breweries and ten small glass factories, amongst others. The daily cement production rate at the Green Island Cement Factory hit a figure of 70 tons.

In the thirties, the financial and economic conditions of Macau started to improve and the social and political environment stabilized. In 1937, Barbosa was appointed to his third term as the Governor of Macau (11 April 1937 - 5 October 1940) and at that time Macau experienced a drastic facelift. The area of Macau was further increased by the reclamation of Praia Grande. Architectural development blossomed including the construction of the grand and elegant Post Office (completed in 1929), the Red Market (completed in 1934), the Penha Church (reconstructed from 1934-1935), and the Grand Hotel (completed in 1940). Buildings with their unique characteristics and charisma sprouted in the territory of Macau and the once stagnant city with flourished life. Under this social background, the civil life of Macau in the twenties and thirties also flourished. Traditional oriental customs and Western religious rites could be practiced fully. On different festive occasions, there were parades and amazing performances, providing free entertainment to the residents. Funerals were also conducted with dramatic ceremonies that somewhat eased the grieving atmosphere. Streets and alleys were the performance stages for the practitioners of some trades and professions such as the peddlers, fortune-tellers and craftsmen who learned to disregard the curious looks cast from pedestrians when a living had to be made in the streets.

Time is a roll of ongoing movie tape. It has started running but is incapable of predicting the future. Every man is a character in a certain part of the play. He is an active player closely following a script development and going through pain, joy, separation and union. Simultaneously he is fully dominated and controlled by the time and space which surrender him ruthlessly to the inescapable experiences of birth, aging, sickness and death. The buildings, streets and alleys, trees and gardens appearing in the play are the print marks of time and space and will continue to be the backdrop of different scenes as the city develops. As we stand in the street trying to retrace the footprints of the past, changes in the characters and scenarios of the play and the fading of our memory as time takes its course make this attempt a futile one.

Macau has been a sensational place full of life and irresistible charisma which has strongly magnetized the local people and the visitors.

In 1925, a 23-year-old Portuguese man, Jose Neves Catela, made his first trip to Macau and was deeply impressed by what he saw. He was enveloped by a brand new world so different from his hometown at Ribatejo. The lion dances, the dragon dances, the costumes and the diet were all new experiences to him. Catela plunged himself into the loving embrace of the small city of Macau and chose to take up a role in that special episode. He worked as a civil servant and participated wholeheartedly in different civil and cultural activities. He got married in Macau, had children before making his final and eternal rest in this beloved corner in 1951. Catela loved photography and was a photojournalist for different newspapers and overseas magazines.

He recorded clippings of the life of Macau with his camera and after a period of 16 years of building up and assorting the photos, he made himself a private photo album called "O DIA A DIA DA VIDA DE MACAU' ("The Everyday Life of Macau"). This precious album of 390 touching pictures is now a part of the collection of the Foundation for the Cooperation and Development of Macau. Credit must also be given to the hard work of the Foundation in repairing the damaged photos and offering us a precious chance to have close encounter with the remote and long forgotten images. To reinforce and make the best use of the documentary and archival value of this complete set of photos, the Foundation for the Cooperation and Development of Macau and the Macau Museum of Art have extended their sincere invitation to Huang De Hong, Huang Jiu Shun, Wu Song Jian, Chen Shu Rong and Chen Wei Heng, learners with profound knowledge in the history and culture of Macau, to write special commentaries on individual topics and captions of photos for this album. On behalf of the organizing units, I would also like to take this opportunity to extend our deepest gratitude to the above researchers as well as, Mr Li Yu Tian for their expert advice and strong support for this exhibition.

For many years, Macau has been an international stage for East to meet West. The accumulation and thorough merging of the Eastern and Western cultures is a valuable and unique heritage endowed to us by our history. This merging of cultures not only testifies to the possibility of the harmonious co-existence of different races but it is also the very basic drive for the integration of a multi-cultural society. An important mission that has been carried out by the Macau of Art Museum since its establishment is to ensure and enhance the identification of the general public with their passion for our own culture. The holding of this exhibition and publishing of the photo album, we hope, will serve the purpose.

When we reminisce about the past, we must also strengthen our awareness of cherishing our cultural heritage, giving proper protection to the diminishing historical buildings and preserving various cultural relics, otherwise, the gradual regression of our society's collective memory and of the vanishing unique culture, something in which we once took such great pride, will be rendered to the extent that it will be impossible to rebuild the cultural confidence we once possessed.

Ung Vai Meng
Director, Macau Art Museum