Some Rain Must Fall
2022 - ongoing
Amidst the rapid advancement of image-making technology, the photograph, with its unique indexical relation to reality, continues to hold immense value and significance. The indexical quality of the photography – its capacity to bear witness to the physical world and the spatio-temporal relationship between the photographer, the subject, and the moment of capture – imbues the image with a profound emotional resonance. This connection rooted in indexicality often touches my heart, making me wonder about the current state of the people, places, and events that were once documented.
In this series of works, I immerse myself in the memories and emotional undercurrents encapsulated within photographs that I have taken or obtained from family archives. The visual flaws that photographs may inherently possess — noise, low resolution, underexposure, accidental motion blur, lack of focus, and so on — in many ways mirror the uncertainties and regrets in real life. Building upon these imperfect photographs, I use 3D modeling software to virtually expand the sceneries, interweaving my own desires and nostalgia into the digital image-making process. Rendered in a hyper-realist style, the unconstrained digital image has become a more controllable, idealized space compared to physical reality. By embracing the indexical nature of photography and the creative potential of digital technologies, I construct virtual environment to confront and process personal desires, and the ambiguities and setbacks of real life.