For Your Eyes Only (2012 - now) (Coming soon)
For Your Eyes Only is a visual love letter to an intimate lover. I am interested in the mundane life, in finding things and making fun of it, liberating it from what it is. This project is a combination of daily life and performance with a naughty attitude. It’s an extension to my “Experimental Relationship” project, which portrays a female dominant relationship.
This project was initialed with the support of EnFoco's New Works Award
Experimental Relationship (2007- Now)
As a woman brought up in China, I used to think I could only love someone who is older and more mature than me, who can be my protector and mentor. Then I met my current boyfriend, Moro. Since he is 5 years younger than me, I felt that whole concept of relationships changed, all the way around. I became the person who has more authority & power. One of my male friends even questioned how I could choose a boyfriend the way a man would choose a girlfriend. And I thought, "Damn right. That’s exactly what I’m doing, & why not!"
I started to experiment with this relationship. I would set up all kinds of situations for Moro and I to perform in the photos. My photos explore the alternative possibilities of heterosexual relationships. They question what is the norm of heterosexual relationships. What will happen if man & woman exchange their roles of sex & roles of power. Because my boyfriend is Japanese, and I am Chinese, this project also describes a love and hate relationship.
This project is an ongoing project which grows with our real relationship but is never meant to be a documentation.
Stills From Unseen Films (2006-2009)
This project is a tribute to all the great films I haven’t seen. I’m very interested in the film stills from those unseen films. The orphaned film stills always trigger my imagination, and become a perfect film in my mind.
In this project, I setup scenes that I would like to see in a film. I pretend that these photos are from real films with various names. Most of these photos depict individuals in certain environments. They all seem to be lost in thought. What are they thinking about? In fact, they are thinking about whatever I asked them to think about. They could be thinking about whatever you think they are thinking about. These photos are from films that exist only in my mind. Now they become films that exist in your mind. In this way, the imagined film is transferred from my mind to your mind but with a meaning of its own.
Memphis, Tennessee (2006-2008)
In 2005, my first adventure outside of China took me to Memphis, Tennessee, where I lived for three and a half years. I went to Memphis without the least idea of what it is like. I now think that I was super lucky in choosing Memphis as my destination among a long list of unfamiliar American city names. Memphis has a unique beauty that is untouched by time. It allowed me to have a glimpse of the city from the past and fueled my imagination of an America of another time. It occurs to me later, that my vision today is deeply influenced by the landscape of Memphis. To me, this group of photos is more like a diary, both visually and emotionally.